Study Of Former NFLers Links Concussions With Brain Damage
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McHale Suffered From
Condition Called CTE |
Brain damage “commonly associated with boxers has been found in a sixth deceased former NFL player age 50 or younger, further stoking the debate between many doctors and the league over the significance of such findings,” according to Alan Schwartz of the N.Y. TIMES. Doctors at Boston Univ.’s (BU) School of Medicine found a condition called chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in the brain of former NFLer Tom McHale, who died in May at the age of 45. CTE “results from repetitive head trauma and can bring on dementia in people in their 40s or 50s.” Mount Sinai School of Medicine Dir of Neuropathology Dr. Daniel Perl: “I think with a sixth case identified, out of six, for a condition that is incredibly rare in the general population, there is more than enough evidence that football is clearly strongly related to the presence of this pathology.” However, Dr. Ira Casson, a co-Chair of the NFL committee that has studied concussions since ’94, said that he “could have no reaction until the McHale case and other recent CTE findings appear in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.” BU Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy co-Director Dr. Ann McKee said that she is “completing a paper on the football CTE cases that could be published as early as May.” NFL Exec VP & CAO Jeff Pash said that the league’s committee on concussions is “continuing its own study of retired players, which began in 2007 and will probably not be published until 2011 or 2012.” Pash said of the BU findings, “I look forward to seeing this report. It’s something we’re paying a lot of attention to” (N.Y. TIMES, 1/28). Meanwhile, former WWE wrestler and Sports Legacy Institute Founder Chris Nowinski Tuesday said that “several former NFL players have recently agreed to donate their brains” to the BU center upon their deaths for further study (L.A. TIMES, 1/28).
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