DEMENTIA IN SOCIETY
Behind the headlines: What is the link between contact sports-related head injuries and dementia? Michael Hornberger is the Professor of Applied Dementia Research at the Norwich Medical School, where his research focuses on improving diagnosis, disease progression tracking and symptom management in dementia. He is passionate about dementia science communication and has spoken to Alzheimer Europe about the link between traumatic head injury and dementia, which has recently received a lot of media attention. There have been many reports in the media, both recently and over the past few years, suggesting a link between head injuries incurred during contact sports and dementia in later life. Could you explain the clinical evidence for a link between traumatic head injury and dementia? The clinical evidence between traumatic head injury and dementia has been known since the 1920s. The initial evidence was based mostly on boxers who often develop dementia-like symptoms later in their life. Investigations of the boxers’ post mortem brains showed that they have similar proteins changes in their brains to people with Alzheimer’s disease. These changes in boxers were named Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy
(CTE) to differentiate them from more general traumatic brain injury. It took until the early 2000s to establish that CTE is not only common in boxers but also in other high-impact contact sports, such as American Football, Ice hockey and Rugby. The research evidence shows that professionals from these sports have an up to four-fold increased risk of developing CTE and dementia in the future. More recently, research has shown that not only high-impact contact sports lead to CTE and dementia but even sports considered lower impact might increase sports people’s risk for dementia. Specifically, there has been evidence that former football/soccer players
Michael Hornberger
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Research has shown that not only high-impact contact sports lead to CTE and dementia but even sports considered lower impact might increase sports people’s risk for dementia.” seem to be also at 2.5-fold increased risk for CTE and dementia. The current suggestion is that heading the ball might be the main contributor for CTE/dementia risk in former professional football players. However, this remains at this stage speculation and there are currently several ongoing studies investigating in more detail the impact of football on dementia risk and which aspects of football might increases the risk. Finally, there is also an increasing recognition that female professional sportspersons might be particularly vulnerable to CTE and dementia. The exact reasons for this are unclear, however, professional women sport is – in general- much younger than their male counterpart and therefore fewer female professional sportspersons have aged to develop such symptoms. Again, this is an area of ongoing research to establish the risk for female professional sportspersons specifically.
44 Dementia in Europe
