New Zealand researchers have supported the findings of a foreign study showing that the risk of brain disease for elite rugby players is 2.5 times greater than that of the general population, with the risk of motor neuron disease being 15 times higher.
The study, conducted by the University of Glasgow, also found that they were three times more likely to suffer from Parkinson’s disease.
The overseas researchers looked at 412 Scottish former international rugby players and compared them with more than 1,200 members of the general public.
Results of the study showed that the exact risk ranged from just over twice as high for dementia to as much as 15 times as high for motor neuron disease.
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The risk of neurodegenerative diseases is a hot topic in rugby with more than 100 former players taking legal action against World Rugby and the national governing bodies of England and Wales over what they claim were not protected from permanent injury caused by repeated concussions.
That group includes former All Blacks prop Carl Hayman and ex-England hooker Steve Thompson.
The Scottish study was “the first peer-reviewed study to establish a direct link with the increased risk of playing rugby”, according to a Daily Telegraph report.
The findings of the study, led by Professor Willie Stewart, were published Tuesday (Wednesday Dutch time) in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.
Former England rugby player Steve Thompson has said he “sometimes struggles to live from day to day” after being diagnosed with early-onset dementia. It comes as a parliamentary report on concussion…
The results have interested New Zealand researchers.
“This study is valuable to us in New Zealand because of the popularity of rugby and other contact sports,” said Dr Heather Murray, research fellow at the University of Auckland’s Center of Brain Research.
“The findings of this study highlight the importance of developing strategies to reduce head-effect exposure during workouts and games, and of being cautious in our approach to head injury management and return to play. We should also explore strategies to improve brain health.” proactively monitor and improve contact athletes during and after their sports career.”
Murray said the study emphasized the need for more research into “the mechanisms of how head injuries alter the brain and how these changes can lead to neurodegeneration.”
The University of Auckland Center for Brain Research developed the sports brain bank initiative as part of the Neurological Foundation Human Brain Bank.
“We are studying the donated brain tissue of deceased former athletes with and without cognitive symptoms to understand how repeated exposure to head injuries changes the microscopic structure of the brain.”
Murray, a New Zealand ice hockey representative, said the results of the Scottish study confirmed the findings of previous studies of neurodegenerative risks in former NFL American football players and soccer players.
She said the rugby study cohort was largely made up of elite amateur level players, “indicating that the increased risk of neurodegenerative diseases now reported in multiple sports is not limited to professional athletes”.
World Rugby
Eye-tracking technology used in a World Rugby project related to current head injury assessment procedures.
Murray said it was notable that the risk varied by disease subtype, with the risk of motor neuron disease being the highest, followed by Parkinson’s disease and dementia not otherwise specified.
She said that in their study, the authors were unable to distinguish other specific forms of dementia, such as frontotemporal dementia or Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers also did not have access to data on the length of the athletes’ playing careers, so they were unable to determine whether the risk of neurodegenerative disease correlated with career length, as has been shown in both former NFL and football players.
“Overall, these findings support the idea that repetitive head injuries are a risk factor for a range of neurodegenerative diseases. Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is the most well-known brain pathology associated with repetitive head injuries in sports,” Murray said.
Getty Images/Getty Images
A World Rugby panel looks at concussion in 2021.
“However, this study reinforces the idea that the risk of head injury is not limited to CTE, and that former contact sports athletes should be monitored for all types of dementia. Any form of dementia is devastating.”
Murray said it was unclear whether the findings would apply to female athletes or non-elite athletes, as there was “very little data on these groups.”
“Collecting this data should be a priority as women’s and amateur sports continue to grow and it is vital that we understand whether the long-term risk of neurodegenerative diseases differs in these populations.
Professor Patria Hume, a professor of human performance at Auckland University of Technology, said evidence that collision sports were associated with increased death rates from neurodegenerative diseases “continued to accumulate”.
“The repeated findings of brain health problems in former rugby players in the” New Zealand RugbyHealth and UK RugbyHealth studies, and now in this Scotland study, add weight to calls for reductions in brain disease risk factors – including repeated head impact in sport,” she said.
“The finding that death from neurodegenerative disease is greater in former rugby players (two times greater for dementia and three times greater for Parkinson’s disease) than a general population, based on analysis of hospital and prescription data, despite the lack of data on rugby career length or history of concussion, again begs the question, why is there a greater risk of brain disease in former rugby players?”