When someone suffers a hard hit to the head, his or her brain can be injured. The most common kind of brain injury caused by physical damage to the head is called a concussion. Athletes who play contact sports such as football, hockey, or boxing seem most likely to experience concussions. But athletes in almost every sport can get them. In fact, cheerleading has the second highest rate of concussions in high school sports, behind only football.

In this lesson, we will look at concussions—what they are, how they occur, and the challenges doctors face in identifying them. We will also cover ways you can protect yourself from their harmful effects.

List two physical activities you often do or watch. For each one, describe how people could get hurt doing this activity, and how they might protect themselves from getting a serious injury.

Goals
Here are the big ideas you will learn about in this lesson:

• Concussions are a serious type of brain injury.
• New technologies are being developed to help doctors diagnose  concussions.
• There are ways you can protect yourself from concussions.

Strategies
You will be using many reading and writing strategies to complete this lesson. The key strategies that you will focus on are:

• Making connections
• Determining important information
• Comparing and contrasting ideas
• Constructing summaries

• symptom
• trauma

Movies or televised sports might give you the idea that concussions are not that serious. But that's not true.

In this video, meet Reed Snyderman, a champion junior freestyle skier. Reed describes his experience with what he thought was a mild, or not-so-serious, concussion that occurred on the slopes.

Click "View" on the left to watch the video.

In the video, Reed says that a concussion is one of the scariest injuries someone can get. In what ways is it different from breaking an arm or injuring another part of the body?

The brain is protected by fluid that fills the space between it and the hard, bony skull. The fluid acts as a cushion. However, a forceful blow to the head can cause the brain to slam against the skull’s inner wall. This can cause bruising and damage nerves that carry signals to the brain. It can also tear blood vessels and cause bleeding. Sometimes the victim is knocked out and is no longer conscious—or mentally aware—of what’s going on.

Two common early symptoms—or signs—of concussion are confusion and amnesia (a loss of memory for what caused the injury). Days later, victims may have headaches and blurred vision and be bothered by bright lights and noise. They may find it hard to concentrate and sleep, become easily upset, and feel depressed.

If someone has been knocked out and can’t remember what happened, it's clear that the person has had a concussion and should get medical attention. But what if a person is conscious and seems okay shortly after receiving a blow to the head?

Some current medical equipment can identify injuries to the skull and areas of bleeding. But this equipment cannot spot injuries that occur deeper inside the brain, where concussions may actually occur. In this video, two brain doctors describe research being done to help doctors recognize the signs of concussion more quickly and more accurately.

Click "View" on the left to watch the video.

According to Dr. Ghajar, what happens to the white brain matter when a concussion has occurred? Why does this affect attention?

When doctors suspect a concussion, they ask simple questions—for example, What is your name? Where are you? This tests a patient’s memory and ability to concentrate. They also look into the patient’s eyes, check balance, and test reflexes—the physical reactions to light or touch that we cannot control.

Both balance and reflexes are often affected by concussions. New technologies are being developed to help coaches and athletes perform these tests on the playing field.

The videos you have watched and the text you have read showed the effects of concussions and some of the research being done so that doctors can better recognize the signs when they occur.

Now show what you have learned so far by answering these three questions. Be sure to save all your answers before you go to the next screen.

In this lesson, you’ve learned that the signs of a concussion are not always obvious, even to medical doctors. As a result, some people suffer concussions without even knowing it, while others may think that a minor blow to the head is nothing to worry about.

Now you will read about why returning to a game, getting back on a skateboard, or hitting the slopes too soon after a head trauma can put you at risk for further and more serious injury.

Click "View" on the left to open the reading passage.

You might have heard the saying “Prevention is the best medicine.” List two to three ways you can limit the damage from a concussion while exercising, playing sports, or participating in other daily activities.

You will now check your understanding of the vocabulary words for this lesson by placing them in sentences. Click "View" on the left to begin the activity.

Before moving to the next screen, choose two words from the vocabulary list and write a new sentence for each word.

Vocabulary words: concussion, conscious, diagnose, symptom, trauma

As the videos and text have shown, scientists and the general public know something but not everything about the causes, effects, and dangers of concussions.

In this activity, you will decide which statements are true about our current understanding of concussions and which ones are false.

Click "View" on the left to begin the activity. Your teacher will review the answers with you.

Then, before moving on to the final assignment, you may want to watch this lesson's videos again or reread the passage.

Reed's Sports Injury

Video: 1m 56s

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Spotting the Signs of Concussion

Video: 3m 17s

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Risky Business

Document

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In this lesson, you have learned that concussions are a serious type of brain injury and have looked at some of the technologies doctors use (or may one day use) to diagnose them. You will now write an essay that shares what you have learned and what you think about it.

Begin by reviewing your notes. Click "review my work" above and view or print out the screen that pops up.

Final Assignment Instructions

• Click The Facts About Concussions—Final Assignment (PDF).
• Choose one of the topics in the PDF and write an essay.
• Organize your response so that it includes at least three supporting details that you have learned from the reading passage, video(s), and other materials in this lesson.
• Use at least three vocabulary words (or a form of the words) as part of your supporting details. For example, for the word jump, you could use jumps, jumped, or jumping.