Soldiers and football players alike are often subjected to severe percussive forces that can result in traumatic brain injury (TBI). These two highly disparate populations are being studied in order to better understand how the brain reacts to such injuries and how medical science can help.

Military Members

Traumatic brain injury is a leading form of injury seen among soldiers. The shockwaves from explosive devices can cause debilitating, long-lasting forms of brain injury. The medical community knows there are links between TBI and mental health problems, including depression and suicide, but the links are little known and poorly understood.

To help advance the field’s research, the Pentagon set up a state-of-the-art military “brain bank”—a medical facility designed to allow physicians and medical scientists to examine the brains of individuals who were killed in combat. But, according to NPR news, a military policy designed to protect the families of fallen solders has kept the brain bank nearly empty, with only six samples currently residing in the bank from military members. Even soldiers who willingly signed paperwork to be donors or to “give their bodies to science” aren’t represented, since the bank is unable to approach the families of the fallen.

If the political red tape can be resolved, the brain bank and the research it produces could pave the way for medical treatments that can improve quality of life for both military and civilian victims of traumatic brain injury.

Football Players

Football players may not face combat, but they are often victims of severe trauma caused by blows to the head. The impact forces they endure during the course of a game can result in concussion or repeated brain injury over the course of a career, according to Fox News. PBS reports that 76 or 79 autopsied former NFL players were found to have chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a form of brain disease thought to affect mood, aggression and memory throughout life after the injury.

What We Know and What We Don’t

What we do know is that chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, affects only those with a history of traumatic brain injury. CTE can lead to depression and other mental health problems, and has been tied to multiple cases of suicide. The most recent example to make the news involved the death of Kosta Karageorge, a 22-year-old football player and wrestler with Ohio State who had suffered repeated concussions. About two months earlier, soldier Joshua Pallotta ended his life after struggling with PTSD and TBI/CTE after returning from combat.

CTE can only be diagnosed after death, and autopsies searching for the disorder are only made in cases where it is suspected, resulting in biases in how the information is collected. The links between CTE and suicide are still only tenuously acknowledged in medical research, according to a recent article in Forbes. What we do know is that there are many questions remaining that need to be answered, so that we may better help our soldiers, our athletes and any other people suffering from TBI.

Making a Difference

Traumatic brain injury is a difficult diagnosis to manage, but experienced catastrophic case managers like those at Paradigm Outcomes can help. To learn more about how our comprehensive Systematic Care Management^SM approach can improve a patient’s health, visit our website, or connect with us on LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook.