By A simple search of the NCAA database by Professor James Hicks of UC Irvine revealed a startling fact about concussions in intercollegiate water polo: there were none. That is, there was no data. None had ever been collected. The subject had simply never been studied.
That is changing with a new study headed by Dr. Hicks and assisted by USA Water Polo. Hicks and a team of UCI researchers will compile the first known data on head impact injuries in water polo. The aim is to measure the actual effects of various types of head contact, including collisions with a ball that can travel at speeds up to 50 MPH. Preliminary results suggest that a deflated ball and silicon-based headgear have positive effects, though much more work needs to be done according to Hicks.
The study is comprised of three main phases, as noted by UCI News.
…In one, Dr. Steven Small, professor and chair of neurology at UCI, and Robert Blumenfeld, assistant adjunct professor of neurology at UCI, will oversee an email survey of water polo players, who will be asked a number of questions about how long they’ve been in the sport, what positions they’ve played, and the number of serious head blows they’ve received. USA Water Polo will assist in the survey by inviting its 40,000 members to participate.
In the second project – now almost done – UCI engineering students shot water polo balls at a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-certified crash-test dummy head to gauge the impact of blows at various speeds and levels of inflation. In addition, they measured the effectiveness of protective headgear. The results are currently being analyzed.
In the third component, Hicks will outfit UCI men’s and women’s water polo players with small G-force monitors incorporated into standard water polo caps to record the intensity of head impacts. “It’s challenging to understand what’s going on in the game, and the monitors will help,” he says.
The subject of head injuries in athletics is a prominent one, in particular with professional American football. That sport is grappling with evidence that suggests its athletes are prone to incurring traumatic brain injuries as a result of repeated high-speed collisions. No such broad trends appear to apply to water polo, though the evidence is almost entirely anecdotal. That will soon end when Hicks and his team complete their work.
See much more about how the research has proceeded in this video produced by UC Irvine.
