Former NFL player Phillip Adams found to have severe CTE / Discussion on CTE and the future of the NFL

[Matts4313]

6 minutes ago, MWil23 said:

I think we agree here. 

I'm simply stating that walking away now and coming to the conclusion that football is going away by _____ is likely very oversimplistic and that there is a LOT of research and decades of studies that need to be done in an all encomassing CTE manner, not just cherry picking football as the baseline "only risk" study as some have unfortunately done.

Honestly, this needs to be thrown back at the health community. Find a way to scan brains for CTE while alive and make billions, maybe even a trillion over the next 20-30 years. 

Edited December 16, 2021 by Matts4313

[incognito_man]

10 minutes ago, sammymvpknight said:

There was another study at Mayo Clinic that looked at high school football players and relationship to neurological disease. They found that the high school football players had a longer life expectancy and lower rate of neurological disease. 
 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22469346/

I think your conclusion is not consistent with the conclusion of the authors. They do NOT make any such claims about a longer life-expectancy or lower rates of neurological disease. That is YOUR language.

Their claim is that their football subjects did not have a statistically significant increased risk. That is NOT the same as stating they have a lower risk.

In fact, their data states that 13/438 (5.2%) of football players had dementia while the control group had 2/140 (1.4%). That is contrary to your incorrect conclusion. The raw data demonstrates a higher incident rate of dementia among football players, but the authors concluded it is not statistically significant.

Let's be VERY careful about inserting our own (incorrect) conclusions and putting words in scientists' mouths.

Edited December 16, 2021 by incognito_man

[sammymvpknight]

4 minutes ago, incognito_man said:

I think your conclusion is not consistent with the conclusion of the authors. They do NOT make any such claims about a longer life-expectancy or lower rates of neurological disease. That is YOUR language.

Their claim is that their football subjects did not have a statistically significant increased risk. That is NOT that same as a lower risk.

In fact, their data states that 13/438 (5.2%) of football players had dementia while the control group had 2/140 (1.4%). That is contrary to your incorrect conclusion. The raw data demonstrates a higher incident rate of dementia among football players, but the authors concluded it is not statistically significant.

Let's be VERY careful about inserting our own (incorrect) conclusions and putting words in scientists' mouths.

Sorry…i reviewed the article…and I must have been thinking about a different study for that part of the interpretation. I’ll try to find that one for you. 

But yes…the found either no difference or reduced risk of neuro disease in their cohort. But I do realize we are talking about high school and not college/NFL players. Different levels of forces and risk factors. 

Edited December 16, 2021 by sammymvpknight

[Matts4313]

3 minutes ago, sammymvpknight said:

do mild CTE finding correlate to symptoms? It’s really difficult to say.

Its literally impossible to say. Doctors dont know if having CTE even affects your quality of life in the majority of people. They know it does in severe cases, but thats generally true with any medical condition. Having severe back problems makes you crippled. Having minor back problems means you need a really nice office chair. We just have no clue when it comes to CTEs. 

Edited December 16, 2021 by Matts4313

[incognito_man]

11 minutes ago, MWil23 said:

I think we agree here. 

I'm simply stating that walking away now and coming to the conclusion that football is going away by _____ is likely very oversimplistic and that there is a LOT of research and decades of studies that need to be done in an all encomassing CTE manner, not just cherry picking football as the baseline "only risk" study as some have unfortunately done.

I don't think anyone is saying "football is going by ____"

I also don't think anyone is cherry picking football as the "only risk".

At least not that I've ever seen.

[incognito_man]

3 minutes ago, Matts4313 said:

Its literally impossible to say.

I mean, no it's not "impossible". It just hasn't been done yet.

[Matts4313]

Just now, incognito_man said:

I mean, no it's not "impossible". It just hasn't been done yet.

Do I really need to disclaimer my comments? Okay

"Its literally impossible with the technology and resources available today and at any time in the near future. Maybe in a decade or two, when we have achieved all the stuff from back to the future. I want to get my CTE from hoverboard mishaps"

Better?

[incognito_man]

Just now, Matts4313 said:

 

"Its literally impossible with the technology and resources available today"

Better?

Yes, that's much better and more like something an adult would say

 

[Matts4313]

2 minutes ago, incognito_man said:

Yes, that's much better and more like something an adult would say

 

Youre no fun. The rest of the post was the best part. 

[sammymvpknight]

1 minute ago, incognito_man said:

I mean, no it's not "impossible". It just hasn't been done yet.

The study will be done...but the question is how to get any relevant information out of it. Because CTE as a clinical entity cannot be differentiated from it's competing differential diagnoses, it would make the study really difficult to conduct. As it stands...we have retrospective cohort analyses conducted at a few centers in the country that conduct CTE research. Ideally we would have prospective studies and better parse would the clinical appearance of these individuals before they pass away. That'd be tough to do...but it would be much more insightful than what we currently have. There is considerable $$$ related to this topic. CTE research is big business...we need to ensure that we are doing this ethically, because there very power people on both sides that have a very strong stake in the results of these studies. 

There are a few centers throughout the country that are highly specialized in their uncommon medical issue...such as thoracic outlet syndrome center of excellence. When that's your business...you're going to have an eye to detect those problems, and your patient pool and research funding is dependent on it. I'm always just a little bit more skeptical of information coming from these very specialized centers. We need more prospective studies, with a wider variety of researchers/pathologists...it'd get the bias down to as low as it possibly can be (not zero...but low).

[incognito_man]

1 minute ago, sammymvpknight said:

The study will be done...but the question is how to get any relevant information out of it. Because CTE as a clinical entity cannot be differentiated from it's competing differential diagnoses, it would make the study really difficult to conduct. As it stands...we have retrospective cohort analyses conducted at a few centers in the country that conduct CTE research. Ideally we would have prospective studies and better parse would the clinical appearance of these individuals before they pass away. That'd be tough to do...but it would be much more insightful than what we currently have. There is considerable $$$ related to this topic. CTE research is big business...we need to ensure that we are doing this ethically, because there very power people on both sides that have a very strong stake in the results of these studies. 

There are a few centers throughout the country that are highly specialized in their uncommon medical issue...such as thoracic outlet syndrome center of excellence. When that's your business...you're going to have an eye to detect those problems, and your patient pool and research funding is dependent on it. I'm always just a little bit more skeptical of information coming from these very specialized centers. We need more prospective studies, with a wider variety of researchers/pathologists...it'd get the bias down to as low as it possibly can be (not zero...but low).

I agree.

I think I stated immediately that the big development in all of this is going to be when we develop the ability to diagnose CTE (and associated risk) on live subjects.

[WheatieMan]

3 hours ago, ET80 said:

I think this was sort of assumed, but now it's confirmed...

https://theathletic.com/news/family-of-former-bucs-wr-vincent-jackson-says-brain-researchers-diagnosed-him-with-stage-2-cte/MBT3eRXLGy8J/

The NFL's days are numbered. These are happening to current era players. I mean how much have protocols really evolved in ten years? What if it is Antonio Brown or that retired Carolina LB (can't spell the name) in a few years? This is just... bad. If it doesn't stop, we are going to flag football by 2030.

[sammymvpknight]

16 minutes ago, incognito_man said:

I agree.

I think I stated immediately that the big development in all of this is going to be when we develop the ability to diagnose CTE (and associated risk) on live subjects.

Just one more thing that I'll add...and sorry I'm busy so I'm not able to quickly whip out the articles right now. But there was a study on military personnel that found they were at significantly higher of concussion (TBI) than the general population. And VERY few of those concussions occurred while in the line of duty. One of the theories is that those that join the military have a personality type to get a concussion. Essentially, they'd be at a much higher risk of concussion even if they didn't go into the military. They also performed a study on medical providers and burn out and found out that medical providers essentially have insanely high rates of anxiety/obsessive compulsive traits, and they looked at those that were strongly considering medicine and were essentially the same in just about every way you can control for, but they didn't go into medicine. Those individuals also had insanely high levels of anxiety/OC traits. So, there is a theory that medical providers have the personality type to overwork and burn out...even if they didn't go into medicine. 

I was prior military...and I am in the medical field...and I think that there is probably some truth to those theories. I also think that there is probably some truth to the theory that NFL players would have found ways to get concussions even if they weren't in the NFL. It would be just about impossible to prove or disprove.

[Malfatron]

13 minutes ago, WheatieMan said:

What if it is Antonio Brown or that retired Carolina LB (can't spell the name) in a few years?

Dan Morgan

[Apparition]

Just now, Malfatron said:

Dan Morgan

Kuechly as well