Gridiron In fact, a study from the Congress of Neurological Surgeons noted that between 1977 and 1998, an average of 13 players each year suffered from permanent paralysis due to football related injuries.
According to the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research, there have been 1,689 fatalities in football at the high school, collegiate, and professional level between the years of 1931 and 2006.
Soccer A Norwegian study found that 35% of 69 Division I soccer players had abnormal electroencephalogram (EEG) patterns. This is more than twice the rate of abnormal EEG patterns in control subjects. Retired soccer players had several brain abnormalities including reduced cortical tissue and increased lateral ventricle size.
Soccer players also seem to perform more poorly than control subjects on some types of IQ tests and many former players (81%) suffer from problems with attention, concentration, and memory. Players who typically head the ball have also been found to have more neurological problems than non-headers .
