A recent study to be presented by Chris Randolph in Paris at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference will be “piggybacked” on the information that came out yesterday. In a Bloomberg News report by Elizabeth Lopatto there was a small preview of what Randolph will be disclosing, and it is not good news for those that are trying to bury their head in the sand;
The study, to be presented today by Christopher Randolph of Loyola University in Chicago, found that athletes who play American football showed symptoms of mild brain dysfunction at an earlier age than nonplaying peers. In addition, there was more illness among the retired athletes than in those who were about the same age.
“You don’t play football without getting a concussion,” said Cornelius Bennett, a former linebacker for the Buffalo Bills and head of the retired National Football League Players’ Association. “We’re taught in football that if you can’t play, you lose your job, and if you don’t report concussions, you have a better chance of keeping your job.”
Very interesting, the information and the quote from Bennett; the primary issue seems to be centered around professional football. What we need to understand is that this also shows the cumulative effects of head trauma (see youth). The study was explained as follows;
The research, released yesterday, is to be presented at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in Paris and compares football players with similar non-football players in two groups. One group is 41 healthy control NFL players, matched with 41 retirees of the same age, education, sex and race; the other is 81 non-players who were older than the retired players and whose memory was impaired with a condition called mild cognitive impairment or MCI.
The NFL retirees showed development of cognitive symptoms similar to the non-players with MCI, an intermediate state between normal thought and dementia-related decline. Usually patients experiencing MCI get Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia, although MCI can lead to other forms of dementia and some patients never get worse.
The article went on to explain the differences between Alzheimer’s and CTE. As more information becomes available about the presentation we hope to bring it to you. I have requested to speak to Randolph, again hopefully he can respond when available.
The Concussion Blog 