Chronic brain injury risk from rugby

Friday May 22nd, 2015

Rugby players could be at risk from a degenerative condition often known as "punch drunk syndrome," doctors warned today.

The sport is known to be tough - and players do not wear the same protection as do American footballers.

But doctors say theirs is the first evidence of a former rugby player suffering life-time effects from the syndrome, known medical as chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

The patient died at the age of 63, six years after showing the first symptoms of brain disease.

The victim had played rugby for most of his life, only giving up at the age of 50, playing at the top levels of the amateur game.

The disease was only diagnosed finally after his death.

Writing in the Quarterly Journal of Medicine, Dr Michael Farrell, of Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, Ireland, said the condition is mainly linked to boxing.

He said: "There remains limited awareness in clinics that the condition occurs in sports outside of boxing…with increased awareness of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, we would suggest the diagnosis might be considered in any patient presenting to dementia services with a prior history to exposure of traumatic brain injury.”

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy: a potential late and under recognised consequence of rugby union? Quarterly Journal of Medicine 22 May 2015; doi: 10.1093/qjmed/hcv070

Tags: Brain & Neurology | Europe | Fitness

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