Athletic Training & Sports Health Care 

About: Athletic Training & Sports Health Care is an academic journal. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Athletes & Concussion. It has an ISSN identifier of 1942-5864. Over the lifetime, 573 publications have been published receiving 2219 citations.

Detecting Neurocognitive and Neurophysiological Changes as a Result of Subconcussive Blows Among High School Football Athletes

Abstract: Recent work suggests that repetitive subconcussive head impacts may contribute to long-term neurodegeneration; however, the risk thresholds for subconcussive injury are unknown. It was hypothesized that the number and severity of head impacts could quantify the risk of developing abnormal neurophysiology. Twenty-one high school boys (ages 14 to 18) participating in varsity and junior varsity football were evaluated over the course of 1 football season (13 games) using a combination of the ImPACT, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and head impact telemetry. The number and severity of head impacts throughout the football season were subsequently compared with the fraction of players flagged by either the ImPACT or fMRI before, during, and after the competition season. Twelve of 22 (54.5%) in-season tests of asymptomatic participants had a minimum of 1 composite ImPACT score flagged. For the fMRI analysis, 16 (72.7%) of the 22 in-sea son sessions were considered flagged. Seven assessments were flagged by both the ImPACT and fMRI. Larger numbers of hits appeared to correspond with a larger fraction of players being flagged by at least fMRI or the ImPACT. A substantial number of clinically asymptomatic athletes exhibit significant neurophysi ological changes in-season. Furthermore, the number of head impacts is a risk factor for the development of neurophysiological changes. [Athletic Training & Sports Health Care. 2014;6(x):xxxxxx.] [Query #2: Reduce to 150 words.]