Boston University
Each year, millions of people are exposed to repetitive head impacts (RHI) through contact sports. RHI can result in concussions and asymptomatic non-concussions to confer risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD) and related dementias (ADRD) including chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Presently, a diagnosis of CTE can only be rendered at autopsy and it has been neuropathological diagnosed in several hundreds of American football players particularly those who played at elite levels (college and professional). The ability to make an accurate diagnosis of CTE is needed to facilitate research on risk factors, mechanisms, prevention, and treatment. In 2015, the investigators were awarded a NINDS funded 7-year U01 known as the DIAGNOSE CTE Research Project (NCT02798185) designed to develop biomarkers, characterize the clinical presentation, and examine genetic and RHI risk factors for CTE. This current 5-year NIH funded multicenter study DIAGNOSE CTE Research Project-II will build on and extend those findings.
The aims of the DIAGNOSE CTE Research Project-II are to: * retain and grow DIAGNOSE-I and examine the clinical and biomarker course of Traumatic Encephalopathy Syndrome (TES); * investigate risk and resilience factors of TES; and * compare biomarkers of amyloid (Aβ), p-tau, neurodegeneration, neuroinflammation, and white matter (WM) injury between TES and AD. The investigators hypothesize that TES has unique clinical and biomarker profiles, and RHI and non-RHI risk factors influence the development of TES. There will be 3 study groups: 1. Retention, 150 former football players and 50 contr…
Inclusion Criteria: 1. Former college or professional football players (n=225) will include those retained from DIAGNOSE-I (n=150) and newly recruited (n=75). Criteria will include 1. Former college football players must have played more than 6 years of football including 3 or more years at the college level. They must not have played organized football or other contact sports following college. 2. Former professional football players must have played 12 or more years of total football including 3 or more years in college and at least 1 season professionally where they played in at lea…