The NHL’s 2010-11 season opens at 9am PT tomorrow when the Carolina Hurricanes and Minnesota Wild face off in Helsinki, Finland, one of several Europe-based openers the league has planned. But when the Boston Bruins take to the ice against the Phoenix Coyotes in Prague, Czech Republic a few days…
After a spring and summer spent, in part, answering claims that the league may not take brain and spinal cord injuries seriously enough, NFL officials cannot have been pleased that the new season’s first week brought all of these questions back into play. During last Sunday’s season opener, as the…
A new measure signed into law in Massachusetts this week raises questions about whether Oregon has sufficiently strong laws regarding young riders and ATVs. As outlined by Boston TV station WCVB, the measure, known as “Sean’s Law,” raises the minimum age for ATV operation in Massachusetts from 10 to 14.…
A report this weekend in The New York Times raised new, and troubling, issues regarding football helmets and their ability to protect younger players from traumatic brain injuries. The newspaper reported that the NFL, last Friday, released data sets related to helmet testing, despite criticism that the information is potentially…
If you arrive in a hospital emergency room unconscious and suffering from an Oregon traumatic brain injury can the doctors use you for a medical experiment without your consent? You might have thought the answer to that question was pretty obvious: absolutely not. According to a recent article in the…
A football player at Eastern Oregon University abruptly died last week after suffering an Oregon traumatic brain injury during what appeared to be an otherwise normal play, according to the Associated Press. Dylan Steigers was 21. He had recently transferred to Eastern Oregon from the University of Montana and was…
An appropriate piece of news with which to wrap up National Traumatic Brain Injury Awareness Month: with a speed few observers expected the National Hockey League has instituted new rules against hits to the head. The NHL Players Association, the final official body that needed to sign off on the…
In the wake of raised awareness of the seriousness of traumatic brain injuries, the military has become the latest institution to adjust its rules in a bid to lessen traumatic brain injuries and their consequences. The Defense Department announced earlier this month that it will “launch a new policy in…
Following-up a story I blogged about last week, news reports today indicate that the NHL is seriously considering an immediate change to its rules that would lessen the risk of traumatic brain injuries by banning hits to the head. Though there have been several serious traumatic head injuries and concussions…
Oregon does not have an NHL team, but many in the state who worry about Oregon traumatic brain injuries have been watching developments in the world of professional hockey over the last few days. As I have previously noted, NHL hockey differs in significant ways from the game TV viewers…