Latest / Broken Brains with Bruce Parkman / Bruce Parkman on Concussion Caps, Brain Health, and Protecting Kids in Contact Sports

Transcript

Bruce Parkman on Concussion Caps, Brain Health, and Protecting Kids in Contact Sports · Broken Brains with Bruce Parkman

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Hey folks, Bruce Parkman here.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to another edition of Broken Brains, one of my favorite editions where we answer questions that come in from the audience and we love it.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: And why is this important?
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because these questions help us present more information to you because the subject of repetitive brain trauma is just not taught out there, and a lot of folks don't know.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why you have to be informed on what this is doing to the brains of our kids, athletes, and veterans.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it's important for you to be informed so you can help them make, you can make proper decisions and you can take care of the ones you love.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: Today, the question came in about these guardian caps.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Look, man, I am about fed up with all these gizmos that say they prepare they protect the brain because to me it's all about money.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: All right, because we know that our parents do anything to protect our kids.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: And when it comes to the brain, there is literally nothing that can protect it from RHI.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the one thing I do like about these guardian cats, two things, is they do reduce concussive trauma by 20% or so, depending on what you look at, right?
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: But the other thing I like about them is because they're up front.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: They say will not reduce repetitive head impact.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So why buy the dang thing?
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's my point.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, we're talking in football careers tens of thousands of hits.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter how much you reduce the contact, it is not enough to offset the damage that's done to the brain.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: This is the equivalent of putting a mattress around your head and running into something.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I mean, players who don't like the way they look, they don't like the way they feel.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, the only concussion on my son's football team when they went to these things was from one of these caps.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: They had no concussions all year round.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: It took one kid who wanted to wear the hat, hit the ground, wrong angle, and got a concussion.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: So the issue is do are we taking brain health a little uh seriously when we put these things on our head?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: We're starting to recognize that.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that is the most important point here is that we know there's a problem.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: When we start shortening kickoff distances, when we start putting caps on players' heads, we are admitting there's something there.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: We might not want to state it openly, but we're admitting something there, and we're trying to do something about it.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's a good start.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: But these caps, to me, are, you know, they're just another gimmick, man.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: They're not gonna protect the life.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: They're not gonna, they're not gonna protect uh, you know, the brain in any measurable capacity because this is not like a brain that takes one or two hits.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is not a concussion, like an accident, right?
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe an unfortunate car crash where the brain takes one hit.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about sports where brains are hit repetitively over and over and over again.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: And protecting the brain from the outside has nothing to do with what's going on with the brain down the inside.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: If you've read our book, you know that over time the brain becomes a bruise, the bruise, that bruise is inflammation, that inflammation starts, you know, getting a reaction to it that over time becomes toxic to the brain.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because the brain stays in an inflamed state, the brain's response mechanisms actually gather up to the point where they start eating the good brain tissue.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: Now, does this sound good to you?
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: And you can't prevent that from happening with a 20% reduction when a player's taking tens of thousands of hits over his career.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: So, great concept.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Does it even sound like it might work?
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if I put a mattress on my head and hit somebody, it's going to soften the blow.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that might work.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: But for a 20% reduction with no reduction in repetitive head impacts, worthless.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Throw them away, put your helmets on so everybody can see the side and keep playing.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And why is this important for us to understand?
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Is that we wouldn't need any of these gizmos if we would make the right decisions when it comes to contact sports.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And what are those decisions?
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: First, repetitive head impacts is the number one risk to the brains and futures of our children.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: This is the largest preventable cause of mental illness in this country.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I lost my son to it, okay?
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: And if they say that Amazon is the beating heart of this world, our children are the beating heart of our future or the bleeding brain if they've been pummeled up by contact sports.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: This is unnecessary.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's preventative and it's preventable.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And by properly eliminating repetitive and impacts before at least the age of 14, we say 18, we're not going to get football and contact sports out of high school.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: So 14 and under, flag till 14.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: And then in high school, take the contact out of practice, please, if you really want to roll the dice.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you a hidden secret.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: There are no baseball players or basketball players at the Boston Union CTE Center, where my son is with all those professional football players, rugby players, lacrosse players, wrestlers, hockey players.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Do you get it?
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's all about repetitive hit impacts.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: If your brain is not pummeled by the sport, guess what?
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: You don't end up in the brain bank.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: And it's that simple.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: So all the gizmos in the world that don't reduce repetitive impact absolutely do nothing when it comes to the future of our children.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: And can we absolutely expect that sport should be healthy?
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: Should sports really harm our kids?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: It shouldn't harm adults either.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: And there is absolutely a way ahead where we can have safer sports for our children and for our athletes.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: Who doesn't want a world when our professional athletes that came out of the hood, that fought to get out of poverty and got all the way through the leagues, defying all odds, were like what, the 20% that actually retire and can make all this money could enjoy the money and could enjoy their families.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's the world that we want as the Mack Parkman Foundation.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: A world where our kids are safe, our kids are protected, and our athletes are able to enjoy their careers and then enjoy the quality of life afterwards.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: So when it comes to these concussion caps, I don't like them.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: You can chuck them away.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: I got nothing really that good to say about them because they don't address the primary feature.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: They say it in the advertising, but we've got to do a better job with that.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is Bruce Parkman from Broken Brains signing off.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I really appreciate your attention to this matter.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Keep sending those questions in.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: We love them here.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, your children only got one melon.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: Do your best to protect it.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: Stay informed.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: Get our book off the website.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's a free PDF.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: I just rewrote it.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll talk to you again on Broken Brains.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Keep those questions coming.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: God bless you and take care.