According to UAB Medicine, a medical journal, there are more than 10 million sports-related injuries each year. About 95 percent of these injuries are minor, consisting of sprains, scrapes, cuts, and bruises. The remaining 5 percent are serious, even life-threatening injuries like bone break and damage to the nervous system.
Those punches add up
Background
Since the nervous system performs almost all of our bodily functions, injuring it can render a person disabled. Frequently, nervous system injuries occur during sporting activities.
Examples
Common archery injuries involve nerve compression and neuropathy in the wrists, which causes intermittent pain and numbness. Race car drivers can injure their spinal chord. Baseball pitchers commonly develop brachial plexopathy, or pitcher's arm, and require corrective surgery. The popular "Tommy John" surgery that pitchers receive addresses this condition.
Head Injuries
All athletes are at risk of head injury, which can lead to a concussion and possibly a subdural hematoma. A subdural hematoma is a type of head injury caused by blunt force trauma in which the brain bangs into the skull wall. The brain bleeds and swells. The blood and swelling create pressure on the skull and the soft brain. Depending on the exact location of the injury, it can disrupt certain nervous system functions (breathing, walking, talking.)
Emergency Treatment
This is a very serious condition, and can be fatal without surgery. The surgeon must make room for the brain to either drain the fluid or expand and swell. If draining the fluid is not enough to stabilize the injury, then doctors take the drastic step of removing a large section of the skull that protects the forehead. They cover that area back up without the missing skull piece, and this gives the brain room to swell unobstructed. After the swelling goes down, the doctors replace the missing section of skull.
Long-Term Effects
This type of injury is common among boxers, who sometimes develop a chronic subdural hematoma. If the boxer suffers multiple hematomas over a number of years, the brain may be unable to repair itself any longer. The result is permanent nervous system damage, which can affect mobility and cognitive ability.
Tags: nervous system, subdural hematoma, head injury, section skull