Chiefs prop Ben Afeaki has retired from all rugby due to concerns about his long term health. Afeaki suffered concussion in February 2014 during an Super Rugby match against the Crusaders.

Up until a couple of weeks ago, Ben Afeaki was excited about his seemingly impending return to the rugby field.

He had been scrummaging, playing a bigger part in training and facing less of the symptoms of a concussion he suffered more than a year earlier.

But testing showed things weren't as good as they should have been, and after a consultation with his doctor, Afeaki decided rugby wasn't worth the risk.

Getty Images Ben Afeaki in action during his lone All Blacks test against France in Auckland in 2013.

On Friday, the one-test All Black announced his retirement from the sport, citing fears for his long term health following his lengthy battle with concussion.

It became evident that taking another head knock could be devastating to the 27-year-old's long term health, with a return to full health far from a certainty.

"Once I got all the information from the medical staff the actual decision was quite easy," Afeaki said.

"Obviously, it was a hard decision for me to make because I've loved playing footy, and it's a massive chapter of my life, but I think this decision was based around my health in the future and that's a lot more important than a couple more years of footy.

"When the boys were in Africa I had a couple of meetings with specialists and they kind of advised me to get some more testing done.

"I did that and I wasn't quite recovered. [The doctors] said I'm going to make a full recovery, which is awesome, but the risk of playing again and getting another head knock really outweighed the possibility of me coming back and playing again.

"Until a couple of weeks ago I've always been training and doing everything right to be able to play, so it's really frustrating. I guess in the back of my head there was always a chance it was going to turn out like this."

Afeaki is close to symptom free after the February 2014 concussion he suffered during a Super Rugby match against the Crusaders.

Having been cleared to return to training, Afeaki suffered another knock a month later, and hasn't played since.

He said if he is forced to work hard mentally he can suffer nausea the following day, but expects that to go in time.

Chiefs team doctor Kevin Bell said Afeaki's decision to retire became a sensible one given the risks of taking another head knock.

"He might have got back to playing and he might have been fine, no one can say for sure," Bell said.

"But the risk was, if he took another knock, which to some degree was inevitable in rugby, nobody could say with any certainty that he would bounce back to 100 per cent, as we're confident he will do this time."

Chiefs coach Dave Rennie first coached Afeaki in the New Zealand under-20s, and said he was excited to coach him again when Rennie came to the Chiefs.

He said Afeaki is a great man, and that the "gentle giant" will be missed by the Chiefs team.

"I think what impressed us about Ben was his ability to change from mild mannered to that sort of beast mode and bring that physicality to the field," Rennie said.

"Off the field he's a great man, he's loved by the boys, he's a keen fisherman, he's got the ability to put an arm around a guy when they need a bit of help and also challenge guys when they need a bit of a finger wag.

"He's been a big part of this group."

Afeaki said he is likely to look for a future away from rugby in the short term. He will look into some business interests in the coming months.