Does the league publish information about heart conditions?
Not in the data it normally publishes.
Football players have been worried about heart problems for decades, and researchers have long studied former players. For instance, in 2019, a study published in the Journal of the American Heart Association found that former NFL players were more likely to have atrial fibrillation than people in the general population. (The study, funded in part by the NFL, acknowledged shortcomings, like the potential for recruitment bias and a lack of long-term oversight.)
Concerns about cardiovascular risks extend to current players. By the 2019 season, the NFL was worried enough about the risk of sudden cardiac arrest that it released an educational video for its teams.
During the presentation, Dr. Jonathan A. Drezner, physician of the Seattle Seahawks and director of the Center for Sports Cardiology at the University of Washington, warned that sudden cardiac arrest is the leading cause of death for Athletes are training. He notes that most cases occur in basketball, soccer or soccer players and can often stem from ventricular fibrillation, which causes the heart to work ineffectively.
NFL officials expect that team medical staff will review the video annually, and doctors feel that teams should include sudden cardiac arrest in their mandatory pre-season rehearsals for emergencies in the game.
The NFL, like other professional leagues and the NCAA, was concerned in the early months of the coronavirus pandemic about the potential for Covid-19 to lead to heart problems in athletes. In some cases, the NFL recommends that players who test positive for the virus undergo certain cardiac tests, such as an electrocardiogram, an electrocardiogram, and an echocardiogram. , ultrasound allows doctors to visually assess the structure and function of the heart. .
How common is concussion?
By NFL numbers, at least, they’re less common than they used to be. During pre-season and the 2015 regular season, including training sessions, the league officially recorded 275 concussions, which can be difficult to diagnose. In 2021, that number drops to 187.
Concussions in particular fell sharply during the 2018 season, after the federation introduced a rule banning players from bowing and using helmets to stab opponents. There were 214 people that year, including games and pre-season practice, down from 281 in the previous season.
