A recent study published by Imperial College London found that former professional soccer players showed structural brain differences and high rates of anxiety and depression, but no signs of cognitive decline.

Methodology

The study included 142 former players aged between 30 and 60 and compared them to 56 similarly aged healthy people with no history of contact sports, military service, or past concussions. Researchers analyzed structural MRI brain scans from a qualifying subset of 124 players and 40 people in the control group to check for regional differences in grey matter volume.

The authors presented the study at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference, stating that their research is part of a major push by scientists to treat repetitive head impacts as a potential modifiable risk factor for dementia in late life.

Findings

After adjusting for factors like age and education, the former players scored as well as expected on memory and thinking tests, showing no significant differences compared to the healthy control group. However, athletes reported much higher rates of mental health struggles, with 31% meeting the threshold for clinical depression compared to 9% of the control group, and 42% reporting clinical anxiety compared to 25%.

The brain scans of the former players showed that, as a group, they had less brain tissue in areas controlling memory and emotion than the control group. But only 2% of the former athletes showed individual signs of severe brain shrinkage that would point to active, progressive neurodegeneration.

Original reporting: Appleton, WI News Feed (HLL/CB) — read the source article.