More than 35,000 college athletes and cadets at U.S. service academies are helping researchers write a new, extensive and groundbreaking chapter in the study and tracking of concussions.
With about $22 million in funding from the NCAA and Department of Defense, the college students have agreed to be monitored over a period of years, even decades, to determine the frequency, severity and cumulative effects of head injuries in their respective activities.
Though the project, run by a group of investigators who make up the Concussion Assessment, Research and Education (CARE) Consortium, is less than a year old, the information scientists have already collected shows the potential. Baseline data has already been gathered on 6,500 students, about 225 of whom have suffered concussions and been evaluated.