Amazing and eye opening story.

[bydand]

You have to read this story.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/OnCall/story?id=3330041&page=1

I really didn't know where to put this, so if it's wrong please shift it over to the right area.

After hearing and reading more on this young woman, I cannot help but wonder if we as Martial Artists take enough precautions in our own training, and in whatever classes we teach to prevent something like this. Granted, it is a rare thing to happen, but even if it is a short term loss of memory, how would we feel as Instructors/Owners/Training partners of somebody if it were to happen during a training session we were involved in? What if anything can we change in the way we do things right now? Not looking for overall, general answers really. I would think each individual answer would have to be a personal one just because of the nature of training.

Now I'm am NOT advocating we all train in foam rubber suits and with padded walls and floors. Martial Arts can be a hazardous past-time and to take that away totally would water down the training IMO. By the same token, while we all know that, we still do take some measures to insure that needless injury isn't part of our regular training as well. Is there anything else we could do/change in our own routine training?

 

[exile]

Whew, Scott, that is scary. Yes, it's clearly very unusual—look at the head traumas people take all the time in rugby, football and other very hard contact sports where this doesn't happen. What I think is scary is, specifically, the fact that typical symptoms of traumatic brain injury—swelling, bleeding etc.—were, according to the story, just not there. It's as though there were one little bitty switch somewhere in there that got knocked out of whack just a tiny bit, and bingo, this young woman's whole past lifetime disappears. You kind of get the sense that there are any number of things working behind the scenes, so to speak, that have very low tolerances for misalignment: just a small nudge the wrong way and the whole world changes drastically. The fact that people do recover all sort of abilities from massive strokes and blunt force injuries makes the extremeness of this poor kid's amnesia all the more bizarre...

The practical question—how to minimize the dangers in MA training of this sort of (apparently irreversible) micro-damage leading to macro-disaster—is really tough, especially if, like me, someone believes that `alive' training for relatively realistic attack scenarios is crucial if you want your training to have reliable payoff for self-defense. Too much protection can inhibit your movements and make the SD-`sparring' less realistic than you might like, but clearly protection is needed which is proportional to the level of violence you're going to be allowing as part of the simulation... I dunno, that's a tough one. Anyone who can come up with a new generation of sparring equipment giving good protection with much less bulk than we currently have is gonna make a fortune. I'm not saying that the problem is just a matter of improving technology, but that kind of development could play a big part in answering your question...

 

[morph4me]

I'm not sure how much more we can do to mitigate our risk and still be doing martial arts. The nature of what we do is physically challenging and dangerous, we willingly put ourselves in training situations where we allow other people to practice potentially dangerous techniques on us and trust that they will acknowledge and respect the situation and, while accidents are inevitable, we expect that we are going to be safe. Freak accidents and unbalanced training partners aside, I think we have to accept the risks of doing what we love to do.

 

[MA-Caver]

I saw this story (elsewhere) and find it incredible and moving. That a simple fall changes one's life completely. Doctors say it's a very rare occurrence for one's memory to be completely wiped. She's like a clean slate. How hard it must be for the parents, who seemed to hold up to this tragedy very well. They adapted and carried on and stuck with her and for that they're to be admired.

With the training in Martial Arts there's always a risk and as many of us know injuries can (and have) result. Sometimes long term effects that have changed the way we do things. But good instructors and good students are aware of this and take steps to minimize or prevent the injuries (whatever they may be).
To me a needless injury is the result of carelessness. Just like with caving, you get careless... you're bound to get hurt, and seriously. But as Exile pointed out even the tiniest bit of adjustment can really fubar someone's day.
Good instructors and good students guard against carelessness. Good instructors will watch their students to ensure that the carelessness is minimized. True an instructor can't watch every-single-person in a large class but that's what pairing mid to higher ranking students with lower ranking students comes in to play. They've been there, they (should) know doing this or that tech/move is going to hurt if it's not done properly. That's one of the reasons why it's done slow the first time. Still, injuries happen and it's to be expected and accepted during training.
Wearing extra gear during training I think would be redundant, restrictive and just plain cumbersome. Sparring is a different matter altogether. It's common sense. But the present padding used i.e. TKD has proven (so far) adequate for protection. Oh sure there's going to be those occurrences where a foot pad slips off and the toe goes right into someone's eye during a head kick or a finger/toe get jammed/broken anyway. It happens. Natural laws dictate it gravity, force, inertia, momentum and so forth. Good Martial Artists (again, should) know this and acknowledge the potential for injury during training/sparring. Extra padding will only minimize the effect and effectiveness of the technique used. Imagine trying to learn techs or trying to spar while you're (both) in a Redman suit?

Eventually technology will help us increase protection during full contact MA and other sports, right now it's what we have that we make the best use of. Common sense, being careful and being disciplined will decrease the likelihood of someone getting seriously injured.

 

[Jade Tigress]

I'm not sure how much more we can do to mitigate our risk and still be doing martial arts. The nature of what we do is physically challenging and dangerous, we willingly put ourselves in training situations where we allow other people to practice potentially dangerous techniques on us and trust that they will acknowledge and respect the situation and, while accidents are inevitable, we expect that we are going to be safe. Freak accidents and unbalanced training partners aside, I think we have to accept the risks of doing what we love to do.

This is very true. The girl suffered a *freak* accident of sorts. You have to decide what risks you're willing to take to do what you enjoy. Football and rugby were mentioned, there's also wrestling, and horseback riding.

I knew a woman when I had my horse, I used to clean stalls with her, she was a philanthropist in the community. She didn't do much with her horses other than pleasure riding. I did primarily Hunters (jumping), with some Dressage, and a smattering of cross-country, riding styles which involve a much higher risk of injury. Well, this friend of mine decided to ride her horse down the road. This was in very rural North Carolina, a car passed and her horse *spooked*. The horse was just walking. She fell and hit her head, it killed her instantly.

You just never know. I think you need to take reasonable precautions. I always rode with a helmet. My friend thought a simple walk down the road wouldn't require one. Had she been wearing one she probably would have stood up and got back on the horse.

 

[Kacey]

That's a really interesting story; I feel sorry for the young woman, but I truly admire her attitude.

As a TKD instructor, as others have said, it is my responsibility to watch out for my students and prevent injuries (or at least prevent them from going past a certain level - it is a martial art, after all, and there's gonna be some bruises) - but this particular incident sounds like an unlikely event to be repeated. And we do take precautions - we allow sweeps in sparring, which is why we require headgear; not because it keeps someone from hitting you in the head (it doesn't), or because it reduces the impact of being hit in the head (relying on that teaches you to drop your hands - which is why we don't use headgear when we're not doing sweeps) - we require headgear when we're sweeping because the greatest danger in being swept is that you will land on the back of your head and severely hurt yourself.

The thing is, we cannot shield everyone, all the time, from every possible injury - or we'll never be able to do anything. Caution is important - but there are so many things that could never happen if caution ruled at all times. What's needed is a reasonable balance between caution and risk.

 

[Sukerkin]

That is a remarkable thing to happen and is something I can empathise with a little as I permanently 'lost' a significant chunk of my memories in my bike accident (as well as a fair slice of my IQ too ).

My experience has been that I have this vague feeling that something is missing on occaision but I don't know what - it's maddening ... especially if a friend says "Remember when ... ?" and I get this odd sensation, like a missing tooth, that tells me I should recall something but I can't!

What is happening, apparently, is that either neurons close to the old, lost memories are triggering sympathetic links or neurons that used to connect to the damaged areas are being triggered by other memories in response to current events. I can see the logic of the explaination but that doesn't make it any less frustrating.

How that poor girl must feel when almost everything has gone I can only imagine.

As to how the physical circumstances of her accident could or should affect MA training is a tricky question.

Accidents do happen in training, particularly sparring, even more so with near-full contact work. The padding/protective gear doesn't really block all that much of the blunt force of impacts, so it could be argued that the only ways to prevent such an accident occurring is to either not spar at all or emphasise the early training of controlling the strength of impacts.

 

[bydand]

Oh, I don't expect to remove the chance of someting like this happening, that would be unrealistic, after all we are training in MARTIAL arts, not a knitting clutch. It is just that I had never heard of such a thing happening from that level of head injury. Makes you wonder about all those times you have bounced your pumpkin off the floor doesn't it thoough, I know it does me. I was wondering only if we were all comfortable in the level of protection we take ourselves and offer to those who rank lower and look to those above them for guidence and an example of how things "should" be done. I know I look up to those who are a higher rank and more time in system than I have all the time, and helping out in the kids classes I know they look to those of us in the front of the Dojo before and after training. I am comfortable in the way I train and help others as being the safest we can make it, without hindering the movements and learning.