Version of recordOriginal research
Assessing the Incidence of Head Trauma in Australian Mixed Martial Arts
A Retrospective Analysis of Fight Outcomes
Daniel A Brown, Garret Gross. 2025. Sports Health.
Published in Sports Health, a peer-reviewed journal
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1177/19417381241263332
Read the full text at PubMed CentralPDF filesPubMed 39095970
The medical question
How often do mixed martial arts bouts end with head trauma, and which fighters are most exposed?
The Fight Medicine Research Institute uses this evidence to frame questions about how often fighters finish a bout after a knockout or a stoppage for head strikes, and about assessment and follow-up after those outcomes. The study counted fight outcomes from video and had no medical records, which determines the questions it can inform.
Summary
In 1473 Australian MMA bouts reviewed on video, 34% of male bouts and 23% of female bouts ended in a knockout or a technical knockout that followed head strikes.
What the work reports
- The authors reviewed video of 1473 bouts from 143 MMA events held in Australia between 1 July 2020 and 31 July 2023, and recorded how each bout ended by sex, level of competition and weight class.
- A knockout, or a technical knockout that followed head strikes, ended 34% of male bouts and 23% of female bouts (P = 0.01). Within each sex, the proportion did not differ significantly between amateur and professional bouts, and among men the odds were highest in the heavyweight class.
- The authors conclude that the incidence of fight-ending head trauma differs by sex and level of competition, and that safety protocols and medical oversight are needed, particularly for men in heavier weight classes.
Limits to keep in mind
- A technical knockout after head strikes was used as a stand-in for concussion, and the authors state that it is not definitive evidence of one.
- Only fight-ending outcomes were counted and there were no medical records from after the bouts, so concussions in winning fighters were likely missed and injury severity is unknown.
- Events without video were excluded, and outcomes were judged from video by the reviewers.
- Female bouts were a small part of the sample (114 of 1473), which the authors say limits what the findings show about women.
Source issues recorded
- Crossref lists the journal under its full title, Sports Health: A Multidisciplinary Approach. The article and PubMed Central give the title as Sports Health.
- Table 2 of the article gives 389 as the total number of male bouts that ended in a knockout or a technical knockout after head strikes. The amateur and professional counts in the same row are 343 and 124. This record uses the percentages and rates stated in the article’s text.
- The article’s Discussion gives the female rates as 7.4 and 11.6 per 100 athlete-exposures for amateur and professional bouts. Its Results and abstract give 12.6 for amateur and 7.4 for professional bouts. This record follows the Results and the abstract.
Publication status and notices
Published in Sports Health, a peer-reviewed journal. Original research article in Sports Health.
Form of this work: Version of record. The version of record is the final article as issued by its publisher.
No correction or retraction notice was found in Crossref or Europe PMC when this record was checked.
Fight Medicine Research Institute contribution
Fight Medicine Research Institute selected and catalogued this study, prepared an original research summary and a narrative review, verified its bibliographic details, and maintains the associated citation record. It holds an unmodified copy of the published article under the article’s licence.
PDF files
- Open the article (PDF): Assessing the incidence of head trauma in Australian mixed martial arts
- Open the record sheet (PDF): Assessing the incidence of head trauma in Australian mixed martial arts
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Article details
- Relationship
- External research catalogued by the Fight Medicine Research Institute. The original authors, journal and DOI are unchanged.
- Published online
- 2 August 2024
- Issue date
- July 2025, volume 17, issue 4
- Repository date
- 2 August 2024 (Europe PMC first-publication date)
- Date used here
- 2 August 2024 (Crossref publisher deposit, online publication date)
- Rights
- CC BY 4.0. Open access under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (CC BY 4.0), as stated by the publisher. The summary on this page is Fight Medicine Research Institute’s own wording. An unmodified copy of the published article is held on this website under this licence. Licence terms.
- Source check
- , against PubMed Central full text, Crossref and Europe PMC. Checked under the direction of Casey C. Sears, Founder. An LLM was utilized as a research tool with direct human oversight.
- Appraisal
- The check covered bibliographic details, links, licence and notices. It is not a formal critical appraisal of the full paper.
- Clinical review
- None. This record is a research summary, not clinical education.
- Funding and conflicts
- The authors report no potential conflicts of interest. The article contains no funding statement.
- Catalog
- FH-034, added
Cite the original work
These files cite the work by its own authors, journal and DOI. Fight Medicine Research Institute appears only in a note, as curator of this catalog page.
Daniel A Brown, Garret Gross. Assessing the Incidence of Head Trauma in Australian Mixed Martial Arts: A Retrospective Analysis of Fight Outcomes. Sports Health. 2025;17(4):689-696. https://doi.org/10.1177/19417381241263332
Related on this website
- Fighter Health: Head injury, concussion and post-bout assessment