For Further Reading

Books

Robert S. Gotlin, ed., Sports Injuries Guidebook: Athletes’ and Coaches’ Resource for Identification, Treatment and Recovery. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, 2008. The editor, a physician, has included an extensive chapter on concussions and other head injuries, providing athletes and their coaches with information on the symptoms they may encounter after sustaining head trauma on the field.

Michael Paul Mason, Head Cases: Stories of Brain Injury and Its Aftermath. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2008. A social worker who helps brain trauma patients put their lives back together discusses interesting cases while giving readers a thorough overview of brain trauma and its treatments.

Louisa Ray Morningstar, Journey Through Brain Trauma: A Mother’s Story of Her Daughter’s Recovery. Lanham, MD: Taylor Trade, 1998. The author’s daughter, Misti Morningstar, sustained severe brain trauma in an automobile accident. The author tells the story in the form of a diary, as she recounts Misti’s long and difficult recovery from brain trauma.

Chris Nowinski, Head Games: Football’s Concussion Crisis from the NFL to Youth Leagues. Plymouth, MA: Drummond, 2006. The author, a former college football player and professional wrestler, sustained numerous concussions, forcing him to give up his athletic career. Nowinski talks about his own symptoms of brain trauma and explores how professional football players and other athletes have ignored the dangers of brain trauma by returning to the field too soon after suffering concussions.

Periodicals

Eric Fengler, “The Science of Head Injury,” Bicycling, October 2007. The author provides a thorough overview of head injuries typically sustained by bicycle enthusiasts.

Thomas Fields-Meyer et al., “After Iraq, Devastating New Wounds,” People, May 9, 2005. A report on the large number of head wounds suffered by soldiers and marines serving in Iraq.

Karen Kaplan, “Doctors Say Man Awoke After His Brain Rebuilt Itself,” Pittsburgh Post Gazette, July 4, 2006. The story of Terry Wallis, the Arkansas man who emerged from a minimally conscious state eighteen years after suffering traumatic brain injury in a vehicular accident.

Jere Longman, “Soccer Headgear: Does It Do Any Good?” New York Times, November 27, 2004. Examines the debate over the effectiveness of headgear for soccer players, who could sustain traumatic brain injuries while heading the ball.

Steve Maitz, “The Concussion Time Bomb,” Maclean’s, October 22, 2007. The Canadian weekly newsmagazine reports on the cases of former NFL star Justin Strzelczyk and pro wrestler Chris Benoit, both of whom died violently. Experts conclude both men suffered from severe brain trauma following numerous concussions.

Alan Schwarz, “Expert Ties Ex-player’s Suicide to Brain Damage from Football,” New York Times, January 18, 2007. The findings of pathologist Bennet Omalu, who concluded that former NFL star Andre Waters’s depression and suicide were caused by numerous concussions sustained during his football career.

Web Sites

The American Crowbar Case (www.neurosurgery.org/cybermuseum/pre20th/crowbar/crowbar.html). Maintained by the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the site includes a history of the Phineas Gage case; Gage was a nineteenth-century railroad worker who survived a traumatic brain injury in which a steel bar pierced his skull.

History of Brain Surgery (www.brain-surgery.com/history.html). Maintained by neurosurgeons at New York University Medical Center, the site provides students with an overview of the history of brain surgery, starting with efforts by Egyptian physicians more than thirty-five hundred years ago.

Motorcycle and Bicycle Helmet Laws (www.iihs.org/laws/HelmetUseCurrent.aspx). Maintained by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, the site provides a state-by-state guide to laws requiring the use of helmets by motorcycle and bicycle riders.

Sports Legacy Institute (www.sportslegacy.org). Web site for the organization established by former college football player and pro wrestler Chris Nowinski, an advocate for athletes who suffer from traumatic brain injury. The institute maintains an archive of news articles about concussions, updates on recent brain injury research, and information on how the families of deceased athletes can donate their brain tissue to medical research.