cobalt_27
Footballguy
Ok, let's do this. The issue of "denial" is going to focus on the long-term impact of concussions and the proposed theory that they cause a distinct neurodegenerative disorder called chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). And #### is going to hit the fan.
Rather than provide my own preliminary commentary, let me offer an excerpt from a recent editorial by Kevin Guskiewicz, Ph.D., who is an immensely well-renowned concussion researcher, who has been a voice of reason, and eloquently expresses in this editorial the opinion currently shared by the majority of the neuroscience community:
http://www.natajournals.org/doi/full/10.4085/1062-6050-48.4.14
Rather than provide my own preliminary commentary, let me offer an excerpt from a recent editorial by Kevin Guskiewicz, Ph.D., who is an immensely well-renowned concussion researcher, who has been a voice of reason, and eloquently expresses in this editorial the opinion currently shared by the majority of the neuroscience community:
http://www.natajournals.org/doi/full/10.4085/1062-6050-48.4.14
Kevin M. Guskiewicz , PhD, ATC, FNATA, FACSM
Pick up a newspaper or watch the evening news or Sports Center, and you're bound to read or hear something about sport concussion. The media are obsessed with this topic, particularly with the negative news that makes headlines and ultimately sells newspapers. Even so, there is good news to report, and progress is being made.
Although the neuroscience community has learned much about concussion in the last 2 decades, admittedly, we have much more to investigate and to understand. The tests for detecting concussion and tracking recovery are becoming more sensitive, especially when used in combination with other tools to create a multimodal approach to concussion assessment.
Despite all that has been accomplished, caring for athletes at risk for sustaining cerebral concussion has always been a challenging task and never more so than in today's litigious society. Concussion is different from other athletic injuries in that we still rely heavily on an athlete's subjective reporting of symptoms for decision making, and we lack the neuroimaging protocols that might allow us to see the damage and understand its severity. The cause-and-effect relationships, or lack of same, between repetitive head trauma and neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) are the subject of significant debate. Several published case reports have described τ protein deposits in the brains of deceased contact-sport athletes, but most of the neuroscience community does not believe that controlled experimental research has yet identified a causal relationship linking repetitive head trauma in sports and CTE.