ACTION AT LAST
Glasgow team given key role as FA launch probe into heading and dementia link
VITAL research investigating a possible link between heading a football and potential brain injuries is to be led by a Glasgow-based research team starting in January.
A group from the University of Glasgow and the Hampden Sports Clinic will assist leading research specialist Dr William Stewart.
Dr Stewart has been selected to lead the independent investigation by the Football Association and the Professional Footballers’ Association after both bodies invited applications in March.
Along with colleagues at the University of Glasgow, Dr Stewart will analyse data from around 15,000 former professional footballers and compare it to results from the general population.
The doctor has a long-standing reputation in the field of sporting brain injuries after his research in 2014 demonstrated that ex-England striker Jeff Astle died because of the trauma on the brain caused by heading footballs.
Astle died of a degenerative brain
disease later identified by Dr Stewart as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a condition traditionally associated with boxers.
The new study is entitled Football’s Influence on Lifelong Health and
Dementia Risk (FIELD). ‘In the past decade there have been growing concerns around perceived increased risk of dementia through participation in contact sports,’ said Dr Stewart, consultant neuropathologist at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital.
‘Research data to support and quantify this risk has been lacking. Through the FIELD study, we hope to be able to provide some understanding of the long-term health impact of football.’
Dr Stewart was one of the founding members in 2015 of The FA Expert Panel on concussion, but left during the application process for the study to avoid a conflict of interest.
If this latest study goes on to establish that ex-footballers are more vulnerable to dementia-like illnesses, further research will be required to find out how the risks can be minimised.
Ex-England and Newcastle striker Alan Shearer fronted a recent BBC documentary on the issue and the response has shown a desire to gain a better understanding of any potential link.
Shearer is among a host of ex-pros to question whether they are at risk in later life as he revealed that he used to head the ball 100 times a day. FA chief executive Martin Glenn added that the new study will be ‘one the most comprehensive ever commissioned into the long-term health of former footballers’ and that the FA ‘felt compelled’ to commission it.
The enterprise is expected to deliver a more accurate assessment over potential links
‘The PFA is and always has been committed to a duty of care for all past, current and future members and has lobbied the football authorities to join with us on all aspects of health and safety,’ said PFA chief executive Gordon Taylor.
‘Neurological problems in later life which may be connected to concussion, head injuries and heading the ball have been on our agenda for the last 20 years.
‘Research undertaken so far has been inconclusive and we are now fully appreciative of the FA’s support in establishing a robust, comprehensive research strategy which will help determine whether the incidence of degenerative neurocognitive disease is more common in former professional footballers than in the normal population.’
While the two footballing bodies will fund the project, sports concussion research charity the Drake Foundation will oversee the investigation.
But although the FA say that they have spent six months to ensure that the tender process is right, a scientist who contributed to this month’s Shearer BBC documentary on the subject said that work also needed to be done to establish what effect heading a ball has on a brain.
Dr Magdalena Ietswaart, coauthor of a 2016 University of Stirling study that revealed the short-term effects, welcomed the decision to fund research but said that more information on possible links was urgently needed, too.
She said: ‘We do not know enough about the link between heading and brain damage, if there is a link, because the research has not been done yet. We need research not just to find out whether there is a link but also what is the link.
‘The FA are asking what the public has asked but by only asking that question there is a risk we will still not know what the dangers of heading the ball are for the 250 million players worldwide who head the ball many times, often from a young age.’