Litigation

More brain donations to Sports Legacy Institute

By Michael Kaplen

The Sports Legacy Institute has announced that three active NFL players will  donate their brains and spinal cord tissue to a Boston University medical school program that studies sports brain injuries.

The Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy ? a collaborative venture between BU Medical School and Sports Legacy Institute  whose mission is to better understand the long-term effects of repeated concussions.

More than 150 former athletes, including 40 retired NFL players, already are in the program's brain donation registry.

The institute has been promoting research on a condition known  as  chronic traumatic encephalopathy which is related to repeated brain trauma and found on autopsy in the brains of many players who have sustained repeated concussions.
 
Sufferers may experience memory loss, emotional instability, erratic behavior, depression and impulse control problems, progressing eventually to full-blown dementia.

As part of the program, the players will be interviewed annually for the rest of their lives so researchers can examine the relationship between clinical symptoms and pathology.

Full post as published by Brain Injury News and Information on September 16, 2009 (boomark / email).