The concussion in sport inquiry will be discussing if there is a link between sport and head injury. An interesting statistic to kick off the discussion was that athletes have a 20% chance of concussion each year due to the ongoing physical training and regular matches. Which is why former rugby union player Alix Popiham is calling for reduction in the amount of contact as he believes that this is having an impact.
Reported figures are that around one million people a year have head injury however 900,000 have none or brief loss of consciousness with 85% recovering after a week and no symptoms which rises to 97% after a month.
So, what’s being done in order to combat this? Lots of work has been happening with charities such as Alzheimer’s society which helps people who have struggled with dementia which affects many ex professional sports people and athletes. There are also clear guidelines from the NHS on what they need to do if they suffer with concussion.
Around one in five people will suffer with concussion in their lifetime and it was highlighted in the inquiry that there was perhaps not enough awareness on safeguarding courses or enough training for concussion which has led to campaigns such as ‘If in doubt sit them out’ which means if you have any doubt or suspicion that someone may be concussed then they should not return to sport on the same day.
