School Sports: Five Myths About Concussions

Courtesy of Courtney Axline, LearningRX


MYTH #1: The two most dangerous high school sports in terms of concussion rates are football and hockey. Although high school football accounts for around 250,000 concussions each year , the second most dangerous sport isn’t hockey; it’s girls’ soccer. Other school sports known for their concussion rates include boys’ wrestling, girls’ basketball, boys’ ice hockey, and boys’ lacrosse . In addition, cheerleading has the highest rate of catastrophic injury.



MYTH #4: Other than rest, there’s nothing you can do to regain your brain skills after a concussion. If you know that your child has cognitive changes due to a concussion, there are scientifically proven brain training programs that can help.

Also known as “cognitive skills training,” intensive, one-on-one brain training forces the brain to better utilize or grow more synapses (the pathways between neurons). By reorganizing how the brain relays signals between cells, you can strengthen the cognitive skills that were weakened by the injury. These brain skills are what we use to focus, understand, plan, think, prioritize, remember, visualize, and solve problems.

The first step in any reputable brain training program is to perform an assessment using noninvasive, precise cognitive tests to measure specific brain skills¬—like memory, logic & reasoning, processing speed, auditory and visual processing, and attention.

“When we work with athletes who have sustained a brain injury due to concussion, we often find that certain brain skills, like attention, processing speed, short-term, long-term and/or working memory – among others– have been damaged,” explains Mitchell, who is also the Vice President of Research & Development for LearningRx, a national brain training company with 80+ centers across the U.S. “Once we know the weakest skills, we provide one-on-one training using intense exercises and timed drills to strengthen those brain skills and rebuild connections in the brain. We can harness the plasticity of the brain at any age – from five to 85 – using targeted, customized exercises that have been scientifically proven to significantly increase how efficiently, effectively and quickly the brain functions.”




• Ensure that your child’s coach is aware of¬—and following—the safest practices for suspected concussions (such as a required waiting period before putting a player back in the game).






While most young athletes will recover from a concussion in a few days, some can have symptoms for a month or longer. A recent study found that the total score on a patient’s Post-Concussion Symptom Scale is linked to the duration of symptoms. In other words, the more severe the concussion, the longer the recovery time.


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