Save that Encepholose- Mariana Monroy, Annabel Martinez, Cynthia Rodriguez and Julia Mendoza

The Master Minds originated in room 218 of the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, and is composed of biomedical students, who are currently sophomores. This group composed of four smart young women leaders that came together sharing a similar goal in preventing head injuries for cheerleaders. In this team you will find Annabel who is our Research Specialist, Julia M. who is our Physiologist, Cynthia R. who is the Team Leader, and lastly Mariana who is the Advertising Agent. The Master Minds mission is“Committed not only to protect but encourage those who stunt, fly and jump in the career of cheerleading to protect their encephalocele.”  This task will not be easy to find a way to protect cheerleaders from head injuries but it’s not impossible, and with the skills of all four of us we will succeed. But before we solve this problem we must explore and research past and present things that have been done to solve this.

The MIR to the left shows a significant lower level of myo-inositol in the hippo-campus, more dead brain tissue, and less connections in the corpus callous. A. right and B. left side, and the blue area is the damaged area. 

Some of the data that we collected mentioned that 18/27 injuries from 1982-2002 were head injuries. Not only that but 16 cases were cerebral edema or hematoma (89%), 13 skull fractures (72.22%) and 2 deaths. Momstream also mentioned that there has been a sharp rise in emergency room visits since 1980. Besides that Washington Post mentioned that all “accounted for 65 percent of all direct catastrophic injuries to girl athletes at the high school level and 70.8 percent at the college level” between 1982 and 2009″. Besides that since 1980 to 2001, there was a 500% increase in hospital injuries in this athletic activity. Also in 2009, 96% concussions and closed head injuries were caused by stunts. We also know that currently they use helmets to practice and that also where most injuries occur. 

In this athletic activity, cheerleaders could get injured from stunts, like being thrown in the air, doing flips or not being catch properly.  Leading the cheerleaders to have skull fractures and concussions, maybe leading them to be paralyzed forever, being injured but being able to recover over time or the worst of all death.