Posted in: NFL, Sports | Tagged: cte, entertainment, football, HRL, JAMA, nfl, sports

Study Shows 99% Of Donated NFL Player Brains Show Signs Of Injury

A new study published in the journal JAMA, focusing on linking dangerous head injuries to playing football, resulted in 87% of the 202 donated brains being diagnose with damage. This include all but one of the brains of NFL players. Though those numbers seem alarmingly high, the authors of the study note that the true risk may be lower than the results seem to indicate.

The brain damage most football players receive is called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, which results from repeated blunt impact of helmet-to-helmet hits and head tackles. The effects of CTE are memory loss, dementia, and depression. The study examined the 202 brains for physiological signs of CTE and took into account the donor's medical history, any head trauma suffered in the past, and their athletic records.

The average was that each donor had played for 15 years and died around 66. 87% showed signs of CTE, which included 110 of the 111 brains donated by former NFL players. College players showed signs in 91% of donated brains. High school players only showed CTE 21% of the time, but these were obviously at a much lower number of years playing than the average. The more years played, the more trauma found.

Those results were compared to patient histories gathered from families, and 85% had signs of dementia, 90% showed behavioral symptoms, and 95% showed cognitive symptoms.

The NFL has been making strides towards making the game safer, outlawing helmet-to-helmet hits, putting in a concussion protocol, and having an independent specialist on hand to determine if a player is cleared to return to a game if a head injury is suffered. The NFL also pledged $100 million last year to neuroscience-related areas, and a spokesman for the league says they remain "committed to supporting scientific research into CTE and advancing progress in the prevention and treatment of head injuries."

The authors noted that these results may be so high because they were done on donated brains with the likelihood that the family already suspected there'd been some damage when the player was still alive — which is why they donated the brain in the first place. He percentages are likely to be skewed higher because of this, but the study does show a correlation between CTE and the types of hits a person receives playing football.

Factors not taken into consideration were the position the players played and the age they began playing football. Also, these studies were done on players who had an average age of 66, meaning a lot of the players played 25 years ago or more, which then doesn't take into account the advancements in helmet technology and the changes in the rules that have been implemented in the last decade. Although the study is important for making the direct link between football and CTE, be wary of drawing the conclusion that 1 in 5 high school players and 99% of all NFL players will have symptoms of CTE later in life.

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