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   Head impacts from single season of high school football produce measurable   
   change in brain cells   
      
   Date:   
   April 25, 2016   
   Source:   
   UT Southwestern Medical Center   
   Summary:   
   Repeated impacts to the heads of high school football players cause measurable   
   changes in their brains, even when no concussion occurs, according to new   
   research.   
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   Football has the highest concussion rate of any competitive contact sport, and   
   there is growing concern -- reflected in the recent decrease in participation   
   in the Pop Warner youth football program -- among parents, coaches, and   
   physicians of youth    
   athletes about the effects of subconcussive head impacts, those not directly   
   resulting in a concussion diagnosis, researchers noted.   
   Credit: © Melinda Nagy / Fotolia   
   Repeated impacts to the heads of high school football players cause measurable   
   changes in their brains, even when no concussion occurs, according to research   
   from UT Southwestern Medical Center's Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute and   
   Wake Forest    
   University School of Medicine.   
      
   Researchers gathered data from high school varsity players who donned   
   specially outfitted helmets that recorded data on each head impact during   
   practice and regular games. They then used experimental techniques to measure   
   changes in cellular    
   microstructure in the brains of the players before, during, and after the   
   season.   
      
   "Our findings add to a growing body of literature demonstrating that a single   
   season of contact sports can result in brain changes regardless of clinical   
   findings or concussion diagnosis," said senior author Dr. Joseph Maldjian,   
   Chief of the    
   Neuroradiology Division and Director of the Advanced Neuroscience Imaging   
   Research Lab, part of the Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute at UT   
   Southwestern.   
      
   In the study, appearing in the Journal of Neurotrauma, a team of investigators   
   at UT Southwestern, Wake Forest University Medical Center, and Children's   
   National Medical Center evaluated about two dozen players over the course of a   
   single football season.   
    The group of players was not large enough to draw conclusions about the   
   differences in impacts between positions, researchers said, and additional   
   studies will be needed to determine what the deviations mean clinically for   
   individuals.   
      
   "Studies like this are important to understand how and where long-term damage   
   might be occurring, so that we can then take the necessary steps to prevent   
   it," said first author Dr. Elizabeth Davenport, a postdoctoral researcher in   
   the Department of    
   Radiology and the Advanced Imaging Research Center at UT Southwestern.   
      
   During the pre-season each player had an MRI scan and participated in   
   cognitive testing, which included memory and reaction time tests. During the   
   season they wore sensors in their helmets that detected each impact they   
   received. Post-season, each player    
   had another MRI scan and another round of cognitive tests.   
      
   Researchers then used diffusional kurtosis imaging (DKI), which measures water   
   diffusion in biological cells, to identify changes in neural tissues. DKI   
   analysis has been used to detect changes in neural tissues to study brain   
   development, as well as    
   brain injury and disease including autism spectrum disorders, attention   
   deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), Alzheimer's disease, traumatic brain   
   injury (TBI), stroke, schizophrenia, and mild cognitive impairment.   
      
   DKI also allowed the researchers to measure white matter abnormalities. White   
   matter consists of fibers that connect brain cells and can speed or slow   
   signaling between nerve cells. In order for the brain to reorganize   
   connections, white matter must be    
   intact and the degree of white matter damage may be one factor that limits the   
   ability of the brain to reorganize connections following TBI.   
      
   "Work of this type, combining biomechanics, imaging, and cognitive evaluation   
   is critical to improving our understanding of the effects of subconcussive   
   impacts on the developing brain," said Dr. Maldjian, Professor of Radiology   
   and the Advanced Imaging    
   Research Center at UT Southwestern. "Using this information, we hope to help   
   keep millions of youth and adolescents safe when engaged in sports activities."   
      
   Football has the highest concussion rate of any competitive contact sport, and   
   there is growing concern -- reflected in the recent decrease in participation   
   in the Pop Warner youth football program -- among parents, coaches, and   
   physicians of youth    
   athletes about the effects of subconcussive head impacts, those not directly   
   resulting in a concussion diagnosis, researchers noted. Previous research has   
   focused primarily on college football players, but recent studies have shown   
   impact distributions    
   for youth and high school players to be similar to those seen at the college   
   level, with differences primarily in the highest impact magnitudes and total   
   number of impacts, the researchers noted.   
      
   The findings contribute to a growing body of knowledge and study about   
   concussions and other types of brain injury by researchers with the Peter   
   O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute. Among them:   
      
   • In the first study of its kind, former National Football League (NFL)   
   players who lost consciousness due to concussion during their playing days   
   showed key differences in brain structure later in life. The hippocampus, a   
   part of the brain involved in    
   memory, was found to be smaller in 28 former NFL players as compared with a   
   control group of men of similar age and education.   
      
   • A study examining the neuropsychological status of former National   
   Football League players found that cognitive deficits and depression are more   
   common among retired players than in the general population.   
      
   • CON-TEX includes one of the nation's first registries of concussion   
   patients ages 5 and older to capture comprehensive, longitudinal data on   
   sports-related concussion and mild traumatic brain injury patients.   
      
   • The Texas Institute for Brain Injury and Repair (TIBIR), a state-funded   
   initiative to promote innovative research and education in traumatic brain   
   injury, includes a comprehensive Concussion Network that delivers expert brain   
   injury education to    
   coaches, school nurses, athletic trainers, and parents about the risks of   
   sports-related injuries.   
      
      
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