Tyler Varga's concussion story

[MrNLM]

Good read. Sorry if repost.

 

http://www.indystar.com/story/sports/nfl/colts/2016/05/09/tyler-varga-and-concussion-lasted-4-months/84145580/

 

My thoughts and prayers go out to all the players who have to suffer this.

[rockywoj]

Hmmm, from reading the article, it sure sounds like the Colts need to get better doctors.   This is quite concerning.

[21isSuperman]

Concussions are brutal.  I certainly hope nothing bad comes from this.  From the way the article it written, it sounds like there may have been some rule-bending by the Colts, like when people asked Varga why he was being told to hit tackling dummies when he's on IR or when the doctor prescribed him amantadine when most other doctors said not to take it.  I don't know all the rules and regulations concerning this, but if players and doctors are questioning what the team made him do or asked of him, it could be some trouble.  I'm hoping everything done was legit.

[Bravo]

 

[ColtsFanMikeC]

I just hope Varga doesn't get in trouble or biased against based on what he said about the team doctors.

[MrNLM]

I don't know how team doctors go about their work, but I would imagine they are under a certain level of scrutiny to perform just like players.

 

Its gotta suck being a doctor and knowing your job hinges on how quickly a player recovers. No doubt in my mind that shortcuts are taken. I, for one, despise ANY doctor who pushes drugs at me and fails to discuss my other options. 

 

Varga is a good dude for standing his ground. The Colts should learn something from this, but I bet they don't.

[krunk]

With concussion symptoms that last that long I can't imagine how far he can continue on with his career. Especially at RB where you consistently get hit in and around your head. He seems to get pretty strong effects to the concussion.

[MrNLM]

1 hour ago, krunk said:

With concussion symptoms that last that long I can't imagine how far he can continue on with his career. Especially at RB where you consistently get hit in and around your head. He seems to get pretty strong effects to the concussion.

Yeah. I don't think he is gonna be playing football much longer tbh.

[Chucklez]

This has the beginnings of Austin Collie's concussion saga written all over it

[MPStack]

Translation, Varga won`t be on the opening day roster.

[Smonroe]

2 hours ago, MPStack said:

Translation, Varga won`t be on the opening day roster.

 

IDK, now that his story is out I think he'll be given every chance to make the team.  Otherwise, they could face a lawsuit if Varga feels he was unjustly cut for being a whistle blower.  He's going to have a hard time making it anyway.

 

The NFL has come a long way.  Bill Curry tells the story of when he was playing for the Packers.  He had headaches, probably a concussion, but had to report to practice.  Ray Nitschke would smack him in the head with his forearm over and over.  If he lived, he passed the test and stayed on the team.

[lollygagger8]

If Varga refused the prescribed medicine to help, what else was done? Nothing? 

[pgt_rob]

Sad to hear that the concussion really lingered that far on. Terrible to live through that. He's been through a whole hell of a lot in his young life.

[Ja'Crispy]

1 hour ago, lollygagger8 said:

If Varga refused the prescribed medicine to help, what else was done? Nothing? 

 

Sure sounds that way. Just the classic dark room and rest until you recover. 

[Ja'Crispy]

The information he divulged really makes me question the team doctors. I already thought we had a high number of injury issues and guys not getting back on the field. It almost feels like they are behind the times prescribing a drug as "dangerous" as this. 

[Valpo2004]

9 hours ago, MrNLM said:

Yeah. I don't think he is gonna be playing football much longer tbh.

 

If he gets another concussion like that one I would say it would be foolish for him to do so.  

 

Guy is not likely ever going to be paid so much he can just retire from the NFL and not have to work again.  

 

And while I get that even an NFL rookie minimum salary is a lot, I highly doubt it's worth your mental health like that.  

[chad72]

12 hours ago, MrNLM said:

I don't know how team doctors go about their work, but I would imagine they are under a certain level of scrutiny to perform just like players.

 

Its gotta suck being a doctor and knowing your job hinges on how quickly a player recovers. No doubt in my mind that shortcuts are taken. I, for one, despise ANY doctor who pushes drugs at me and fails to discuss my other options. 

 

Varga is a good dude for standing his ground. The Colts should learn something from this, but I bet they don't.

 

I love that you said that. This was a few years ago. When I tore my meniscus, the doctors in Carmel told me I HAD TO get surgery while the Shelbourne knee center, that gave me a second opinion downtown, told me that "if I had surgery and things didn't get that better and the pain came back within a year, you'd be second guessing yourself all over again, why go under the knife and subject yourself to all post surgery complications if you can rehab". Those were their exact words. I did rehab, it worked out great for me and it is not like I am a professional athlete that needs to go back out there on the field quickly, I work a desk job. So, there was really no reason I HAD TO get a surgery.

 

My neighbor, with good insurance, got his arthroscopic surgery in the same situation a month later, and then a year later, his wife told my wife he is experiencing pain there again, go figure. Now, you hear commercials on radio "if you have had meniscus surgery within the last 6 months and continue to have the pain, participate in this trial, blah, blah, blah...". It is this vicious cycle of advertising for a drug, then turning around to hear advertisements of lawyers filing lawsuits against drugs and their side effects. When "green" is tied to all the advice you give a patient, it cannot be impartial and objective.

 

Big Pharma is too powerful, I despise them and any doctor that pushes drugs without exploring all other options with a patient. Being a doctor nowadays with reps and others telling you what to do has to be tough though. I am glad I have one that talks through all my options. Alternative medicine, integrative medicine that focuses on the cause and not just symptoms should be the way to go, IMO, not doctors who continue to treat symptoms hoping a drug works and then move on to another drug and so on...

 

#OffMySoapboxNow

[aaron11]

this was a good read, but it gave me the impression that he should just retire now.

 

if he got concussed that badly on a play that no one even noticed it will probably happen again

 

i would seek out Austin collie, and ask him for some advice

[aaron11]

5 hours ago, MPStack said:

Translation, Varga won`t be on the opening day roster.

this is much deeper than the opening day roster

[Coffeedrinker]

30 minutes ago, chad72 said:

 

I love that you said that. This was a few years ago. When I tore my meniscus, the doctors in Carmel told me I HAD TO get surgery while the Shelbourne knee center, that gave me a second opinion downtown, told me that "if I had surgery and things didn't get that better and the pain came back within a year, you'd be second guessing yourself all over again, why go under the knife and subject yourself to all post surgery complications if you can rehab". Those were their exact words. I did rehab, it worked out great for me and it is not like I am a professional athlete that needs to go back out there on the field quickly, I work a desk job. So, there was really no reason I HAD TO get a surgery.

 

My neighbor, with good insurance, got his arthroscopic surgery in the same situation a month later, and then a year later, his wife told my wife he is experiencing pain there again, go figure. Now, you hear commercials on radio "if you have had meniscus surgery within the last 6 months and continue to have the pain, participate in this trial, blah, blah, blah...". It is this vicious cycle of advertising for a drug, then turning around to hear advertisements of lawyers filing lawsuits against drugs and their side effects. When "green" is tied to all the advice you give a patient, it cannot be impartial and objective.

 

Big Pharma is too powerful, I despise them and any doctor that pushes drugs without exploring all other options with a patient. Being a doctor nowadays with reps and others telling you what to do has to be tough though. I am glad I have one that talks through all my options. Alternative medicine, integrative medicine that focuses on the cause and not just symptoms should be the way to go, IMO, not doctors who continue to treat symptoms hoping a drug works and then move on to another drug and so on...

 

#OffMySoapboxNow

Many doctors, not all, nowadays are nothing more than pharmaceutical reps.  This came to a head many years ago when I was taking my young son to the doctor and the doctor looked at him and prescribed something, then he said, if this doesn't work then we'll trying something else.  I told him my son is not a guinea pig and we weren't going to keep pumping him full of different drugs hoping one will mask his symptoms.

[chad72]

11 minutes ago, Coffeedrinker said:

Many doctors, not all, nowadays are nothing more than pharmaceutical reps.  This came to a head many years ago when I was taking my young son to the doctor and the doctor looked at him and prescribed something, then he said, if this doesn't work then we'll trying something else.  I told him my son is not a guinea pig and we weren't going to keep pumping him full of different drugs hoping one will mask his symptoms.

 

Yeah, don't get me started on this. The only reason I go to doctors nowadays is not for treatment, it is for authorized diagnostics that I need a doctor to sign off on. Based on the diagnostic results, I will research my own options before accepting any kind of drug. I think the focus should be on greater diagnostics. My friend who works at Roche Diagnostics tells me that diagnostics can be made advanced enough to figure out if a certain drug would work on a certain patient before they are prescribed. In fact insurance companies like that, he said, and if that approach is taken and covered by insurance, I feel it would be better for everyone in the long term.

[bababooey]

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2016/05/10/recovered-from-four-month-concussion-tyler-varga-is-back-with-the-colts/

 

More info, pretty concerning to hear that about the team doctor.

 

Quote

Buried in the lengthy article is one disturbing nugget. Varga claims that a Colts doctor prescribed Amantadine, a drug developed to treat Parkinson’s disease.

“You should definitely take it,” the Colts doctor (whom Varga declined to name) told Varga.

Varga said he then reached out to several doctors he knows from Yale. “They got back to me within five minutes. And all of them were like, ‘Don’t take that,'” Varga said, explaining that he was concerned about the potential side effects.

“The worst case, they told me, were some psychotic reactions like schizophrenia,” Varga said. “And you just can’t stop taking it. You up the dosage until you’re symptom-free. That’s my understanding of it. It sounded pretty scary to me.”

So Varga told the Colts doctor that Varga wouldn’t be taking the medication. And 45 minutes later Varga learned he was being placed on injured reserve.

 

[MPStack]

1 hour ago, aaron11 said:

this is much deeper than the opening day roster

I completely agree with you! His health is what is most important, but this story is by no means over.

[Horse Shoe Heaven]

Hum holding out hope Varga gets through this but not looking good for sure!

[akcolt]

He graduated from Yale as the schools poster boy for football. He won't have money problems 

[Superman]

I don't understand what the team doctor did wrong. They prescribed a medication that Varga didn't want to take. After researching it, he decided not to take it. Per the Indystar article: 

“It sounds like you got some good advice,” Varga says the [team] doctor told him. “You should go with your gut.”

 

So what's the problem? Patient is prescribed medicine, tells the doctor he doesn't want the medicine, the doctor says okay. I fully support Varga's right to refuse certain treatment, but I don't understand why his refusal means the doctor was wrong. Studies have shown that this medication helps speed up recovery after brain trauma. It's up to the patient to discuss the medication with his doctor and determine whether he wants to take it or not. Just like any other medication.

 

As for general treatment of concussions, what's the protocol? Rest, darkness, wait for the symptoms to go away. Per the article, it's only recently that some have suggested that's not the best treatment, but the truth is there's TONS that remains unknown about treatment/recovery after concussion. I really don't see what the doctor(s) did wrong.

 

I also don't see what the team did wrong. I don't believe the rules prevent players from working out while they're on IR. I'm pretty sure the rule is they can't practice with the team, doesn't mean they can't work out individually. I'm probably 89% sure on this... If that's the case, having Varga workout isn't a violation. He didn't say he didn't want to, and it was only after his workout that he didn't feel good again. 

[Superman]

By the way, there is a collectively bargained process for a player to officially request a second opinion before treatment, and then the team doctors can implement the alternative treatment. 

[cbear]

I don't know if Keefer had an agenda here, but that was a very one sided article that, purposely or not, made the Colts doctors and team in general look incompetent or uncaring at best, negligent at worse.

 

With that kind of tenor, he should have reached out to the team and tried to get the complete picture.  This story went way beyond just showing the difficulties Varga had to endure.  He might as well have gone all the way and just said the team was negligent.  I usually like Keefer's articles, but this one was puzzling.

[Dustin]

2 minutes ago, cbear said:

I don't know if Keefer had an agenda here, but that was a very one sided article that, purposely or not, made the Colts doctors and team in general look incompetent or uncaring at best, negligent at worse.

 

With that kind of tenor, he should have reached out to the team and tried to get the complete picture.  This story went way beyond just showing the difficulties Varga had to endure.  He might as well have gone all the way and just said the team was negligent.  I usually like Keefer's articles, but this one was puzzling.

 

Yeah, i don't read Keefer at all, but this article is extremely one-sided and might cost Varga a roster spot now. 

[Superman]

15 minutes ago, cbear said:

I don't know if Keefer had an agenda here, but that was a very one sided article that, purposely or not, made the Colts doctors and team in general look incompetent or uncaring at best, negligent at worse.

 

With that kind of tenor, he should have reached out to the team and tried to get the complete picture.  This story went way beyond just showing the difficulties Varga had to endure.  He might as well have gone all the way and just said the team was negligent.  I usually like Keefer's articles, but this one was puzzling.

 

I agree that the article was one-sided, but it did say the Colts declined to comment on the Varga situation, so I assume Keefer did at least reach out to the team.

[cbear]

2 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

I agree that the article was one-sided, but it did say the Colts declined to comment on the Varga situation, so I assume Keefer did at least reach out to the team.

 

Thanks.  I missed that.  Makes me feel a bit better about Keefer,  I like the guy as a writer.

[Superman]

16 minutes ago, cbear said:

 

Thanks.  I missed that.  Makes me feel a bit better about Keefer,  I like the guy as a writer.

 

I'm "meh" on all Indy Colts coverage right now. Keefer is a good writer, but I don't think any of them are doing a good job of covering the team. They ask terrible questions in pressers, then they complain that they don't get enough access. Just yesterday Holder was complaining that the team didn't do intro pressers for the new coaches when they were hired, which is laughable since Holder asks the worst questions out of all of them.

 

JMO

[cbear]

6 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

I'm "meh" on all Indy Colts coverage right now. Keefer is a good writer, but I don't think any of them are doing a good job of covering the team. They ask terrible questions in pressers, then they complain that they don't get enough access. Just yesterday Holder was complaining that the team didn't do intro pressers for the new coaches when they were hired, which is laughable since Holder asks the worst questions out of all of them.

 

JMO

 

I like Keefer as a writer.  His style does have a nice flow to it.  His article on Indy 500 was really well received though a bit long.  

 

But as far as actually "reporting," I agree.  Most reporters today are terrible.  Honestly, the internet has really dumbed down what we used to call reporting.  I firmly believe that most reporters just peruse the web and report on each other's reporting.  It used to be "get it right."  Now it's "get the most clicks."  Terrible.  You can still get some really good breaking news/insider news, but it is so rare nowadays.

[southwest1]

14 hours ago, Chucklez said:

This has the beginnings of Austin Collie's concussion saga written all over it

It's all fun & games until somebody brings up Austin Collie's name. Let's pray Varga doesn't suffer the same fate. 

 

The memory loss would frighten the hades out of me. Not being able to remember any of the apartments I was in just 5 minutes ago because no amount of rehab, medication, or alternative therapy will ever fill in those brain gaps & as you age, these concussion gaps get wider & more frequent in magnitude. 

 

Yes, I know that Tyler knew the risks stepping on a helmet. I just feel bad for guys who have no idea what they did a few minutes ago after a big hit. 

 

 

[Cynjin]

6 hours ago, bababooey said:

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2016/05/10/recovered-from-four-month-concussion-tyler-varga-is-back-with-the-colts/

 

More info, pretty concerning to hear that about the team doctor.

 

 

 

It would be concerning IF that is the whole story, which I doubt.  Florio's assessment of Keefer's article is really sad, it's hard to believe that Florio can't even read a newspaper article and give an accurate account of what was in the article.  Florio should just stop writing, he has actual writers on staff, just let them do all the posts on PFT.

[Defjamz26]

Wow concussions are no joke. It's crazy how different and varied the symptoms can be. I remember reading the story about how Kevin Kolb was driving into an oncoming lane of traffic on his way to the team facility. Months after and Varga was still having dizzy fits and felt sick. It's brutal man.

 

Idk how many of you follow professional wrestling but Daniel Bryan, who was a popular wrestler retired because a multitude of concussions over his career were causing him to actually have seizures. There's almost no limit to how destructive concussions can be.

 

I really feel for Varga and wouldn't be upset if he changed his mind and decided to hang it up. I see why Borland didn't want to play anymore.

[crazycolt1]

1 hour ago, Defjamz26 said:

Wow concussions are no joke. It's crazy how different and varied the symptoms can be. I remember reading the story about how Kevin Kolb was driving into an oncoming lane of traffic on his way to the team facility. Months after and Varga was still having dizzy fits and felt sick. It's brutal man.

 

Idk how many of you follow professional wrestling but Daniel Bryan, who was a popular wrestler retired because a multitude of concussions over his career were causing him to actually have seizures. There's almost no limit to how destructive concussions can be.

 

I really feel for Varga and wouldn't be upset if he changed his mind and decided to hang it up. I see why Borland didn't want to play anymore.

A agree, you never know. I have seen first hand the results of what a concussion can do. My middle Grandson was an all star linebacker for his high school and suffered his 1st concussion as a junior and missed the last 4 games of the season. As a senior he had a massive concussion that took away any possibility of him ever playing football again. He has been out of high school now for three years and still suffers from effects from the concussion. He has an uncontrollable shake in his right arm and hand due to the damage that was done. I have had him to the best doctors and all they can tell me is that only time will tell if it ever gets better at this point. He was a beast when he played and had hopes of playing in college. He had already visited IU and Ball State upon request for them to look at him and also had 6 letters of inquiry from colleges farther away. It saddens me because I was pushing him and support him by taking and going to all the practices and games. It's a double edge sword that cuts deep.

[southwest1]

1 hour ago, crazycolt1 said:

A agree, you never know. I have seen first hand the results of what a concussion can do. My middle Grandson was an all star linebacker for his high school and suffered his 1st concussion as a junior and missed the last 4 games of the season. As a senior he had a massive concussion that took away any possibility of him ever playing football again. He has been out of high school now for three years and still suffers from effects from the concussion. He has an uncontrollable shake in his right arm and hand due to the damage that was done. I have had him to the best doctors and all they can tell me is that only time will tell if it ever gets better at this point. He was a beast when he played and had hopes of playing in college. He had already visited IU and Ball State upon request for them to look at him and also had 6 letters of inquiry from colleges farther away. It saddens me because I was pushing him and support him by taking and going to all the practices and games. It's a double edge sword that cuts deep.

So sorry to hear about your middle grandson CC1. I wouldn't wish the aftermath of concussion symptoms on anybody. I sincerely hope that the brain trauma he suffered doesn't affect the quality of his life later on my friend. 

[crazycolt1]

3 minutes ago, southwest1 said:

So sorry to hear about your middle grandson CC1. I wouldn't wish the aftermath of concussion symptoms on anybody. I sincerely hope that the brain trauma he suffered doesn't affect the quality of his life later on my friend. 

Thank you very much. Things like this puts perspective on a lot of things. We all love to watch great football players from pop warner all the way to the pros. It's reasons like this where you think to yourself is the fame and money really worth the gamble. There is a reason why the concussion issue is real when you live it every day.

[HOZER]

Wow, I knew it had to be pretty serious for him to have been placed on season ending IR, but man this doesn't look good. I hope he can get back out there and do well, but the other poster is right, very similar to the Collie situation. I still remember the game Collie went down and was motionless for a bit, that was heart wrenching!

 

The whole concusion protocol sure has changed! My daughter was hit in the back of the head with a pencil pouch that someone threw in hallway, ended up diagnosed with concusion and missed several softball/volleyball games and hours of school. When I was a teenager back in the 90's I was an amateur boxer, and let's just say there were a couple times I had my bell rung! After fight was over, Doc would shine light in my eyes, ask if I knew where I was, then say meh he's fine just make sure he wakes up in the morning, lol.