Spinal cord injuries, or SCIs, are traumatic injuries that trigger temporary or permanent damage to the main nerve pathway between your brain and body. Involvement in organized sports is a known underlying factor in a significant number of these injuries. Football players commonly perform certain actions and movements that increase their risks for a temporary or permanent SCI.
Basics
Your spinal cord is roughly 18 inches long and runs inside your spinal column from the base of your brain to the first lumbar vertebra in your back. Nerves branching from this short cord provide sensation and movement from your neck downward. When you damage your spinal column, the severity of your injury depends in part on its location on your spinal cord, with damage higher on the cord corresponding to increasingly greater losses in normal body function. Roughly half of SCIs results in the complete loss of function below the injury site; the other half results in a partial loss.
Football-Related Risks
Football frequently involves incurring sharp blows that can damage your spinal cord, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine's Medline Plus. Involvement in football also exposes you to bending and twisting forces on your neck and/or back that can lead to cord injury. In addition to lasting spinal cord damage, football players also can undergo temporary injuries called spinal cord concussions, as well as temporary spinal cord bruising that can trigger symptoms such as burning, numbness, tingling and sensations similar to an electrical shock.
Potential Symptoms
Spinal cord injuries are clear medical emergencies, Medline Plus notes. If you develop an SCI in your neck, potential symptoms include paralysis below your neck, numbness, breathing problems and loss of bowel or bladder control. If you develop an SCI in your chest area, these same symptoms can appear in your legs. Injuries below your fist lumbar vertebra in your lower back will not cause spinal cord damage, but they can result in localized damage to your nerve roots and symptoms similar to those of an SCI.
Considerations and Outlook
Football players can reduce their SCI-related risks by properly strengthening and conditioning their head and neck muscles before participating in game situations, according to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons. They also can reduce their risks by learning and adhering to tackling and blocking techniques that lower their chances of incurring spinal damage. People who recover some degree of sensation or movement within a week of an SCI have relatively high chances of recovering at least some normal function, while those who don't experience improvements within a half-year typically have higher chances of experiencing permanent loss of function. Consult your doctor for more information.
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