concussion

A team of researchers, led by Philip V. Bayly in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, plans to use MRI to study the brains of healthy, uninjured individuals to create models of brain motion to enable the researchers to predict the chronic effects of repeated head impacts in both men and women.

Explosive devices are the most common cause of traumatic brain injuries in veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. A new study shows that military personnel with brain trauma related to such blasts had outcomes similar to those with brain injury from other causes, according to researchers at the School of Medicine.

Athletes with concussions aren’t allowed to compete again right away, and a Washington University concussion expert advises that children with concussions also may not be able to go back to the classroom right away. Pictured is an image of the brain.

An advanced imaging technique has revealed that some U.S. military personnel with mild blast-related traumatic brain injuries have abnormalities in the brain that have not been seen with other types of imaging. The abnormalities were found in the brain’s white matter, the wiring system that nerve cells in the brain use to communicate with each other.

Young athletes are especially vulnerable to concussions because their brains are still developing. A team of concussion experts, led by a Washington University sports medicine specialist, recommends that no athlete be allowed back into competition the day of injury. It may be weeks or even months before it’s safe to go back on the playing field.  

Missouri lawmakers should give serious consideration to a proposed bill requiring medical examinations for high school athletes who suffer a head injury, according to recent testimony by WUSTL sports medicine expert Mark E. Halstead, M.D.

Mechanical engineers at Washington University in St. Louis and their collaborators have devised a technique on humans that for the first time shows just what the brain does when the skull accelerates. What they’ve done is use a technique originally developed to measure cardiac deformation to image deformation in human subjects during repeated mild head decelerations.

Heather Parrott and Jay Webb measure accelerations on a frozen field.This month, more than 130 million people will tune their televisions to football’s biggest event, the Super Bowl. It’s not certain which team will win, but it’s a good bet that someone may be injured. In fact, injuries are common to football at every level. In recent years, the sport has focused on playing fields as a significant source of injury, and new surfaces have been developed. But are the new surfaces safer? Emergency medicine researchers at the School of Medicine have found that in terms of concussion risk, the new fields are no safer, and they may get worse over time.

Heather Parrott and Jay Webb measure accelerations on a frozen field.This month, more than 130 million people will tune their televisions to football’s biggest event, the Super Bowl. It’s not certain which team will win, but it’s a good bet that someone may be injured. In fact, injuries are common to football at every level. In recent years, the sport has focused on playing fields as a significant source of injury, and new surfaces have been developed. But are the new surfaces safer? Emergency medicine researchers at the School of Medicine have found that in terms of concussion risk, the new fields are no safer, and they may get worse over time.