Heading the Ball in Soccer May Cause Brain Damage

Instead, concerned parents and youth sports governing bodies should focus on ways to reduce risky player-to-player contact, where most concussions occur, said Colorado School of Public Health researcher Dawn Comstock, one of the study’s authors.

Health researchers and soccer moms have known for years that more concussions occur in high school soccer than in any other sport except for football.

Co-author Sarah K. Fields, JD, PhD, also of the University of Colorado Denver, told MedPage Today via e-mail that this study arose from her participation in a New York Times debate about the mechanisms of high school concussions in soccer. But more than half of these heading-related concussions were caused by collisions with another player rather than with the ball. They stressed that such information is required to foster evidence-based, targeted prevention efforts to effectively reduce soccer-related concussions.

To that point, Oxborough said anyone who has suffered a concussion must rest for a period of time, and return to normal activities only gradually, to ensure the head injury heals properly. One player’s head hitting another player’s head, or a shoulder-to-head [collision]. “That’s the problem. Not the ball”.

But says Comstock: “If the rules of soccer were simply enforced better, we would actually be more successful in reducing concussion rates”. “And there are rules of the game that already exist that penalize the kind of unsafe out-of-position contested heading that results in athlete-to-athlete contact”.

“I’ve played recreational level soccer for 40 years and have been a fan of elite soccer for just as long, so I shouldn’t have been surprised by these proportions, but I was”, she said. The findings were published online on July 13 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

That could have benefits for the thousands of children who are involved in the sport, given the surge in popularity of high school soccer in recent decades. He said caution against fighting and reckless play will be highlighted by the group’s soccer rules committee for the upcoming season.

More than 1,000 concussions occurred in boys and girls during soccer games and practices in the study years.

Heading is the most concussion-prone activity, accounting for more than 30 percent of all concussions among boys, and more than 25 percent among girls, the investigators reported. Research funding was also provided by the National Federation of State High School Associations, National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment, DonJoy Orthotics, and EyeBlack. “But be clear that what’s causing concussions is not the ball”.

“I’m a soccer fan and a major supporter of youth athletics of all different types”, he said. Many sports analysts attributed their win to their aggressive playing style. Abuse is abuse. Furthermore, for the soccer purists who claim that concussions are reduced if heading a soccer ball is properly taught, I contend that millions of concussions are derived by the simple exercise of attempting to learn the “correct” technique. Stern said. “Understanding difference in playing style might help us understand how to prevent concussions without eliminating heading from the game of soccer”, he said. It is important to note, though, that this concern is probably not from heading the ball, but rather from colliding with other players.