where improvement is needed, including “streamlining functions that effectively accomplish the stated DCoE mission and vision.” “Our job is to make the system better so that our service members, their families and veterans get better care,” he told the Recovering Warrior Task Force, whose mission is to provide DOD with advice on managing care for post-traumatic stress disorder and TBI. In addition, he called on DOD as well as the services to adopt strategies to better recognize PTSD among returning warriors and to step up efforts to ensure those who need treatment stick with it. The Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury was established in 2007 to develop excellence in prevention, outreach and care for service members with psychological health conditions including TBI. It oversees three centers: the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, the Deployment Health Clinical Center and the National Center for Telehealth and Technology. Story published in American Forces Press Service, Washington, DC, Jan. 16, 2013 Poorer neighborhoods often have less safe playgrounds Most playgrounds are safe for children, but many of them -- particularly those in poorer neighborhoods -- need improvement, a Chicago-area survey found. The good news is that many of the safety issues, such as increasing the depth of wood chips covering playground surfaces, are easily correctable. And a softer landing can mean the difference between a harmless fall and one that causes serious injury, an expert said. There are about 500 playgrounds in the Chicago area, according to study background information. The researchers assessed 467 of those playgrounds in 2009 and 459 in 2010. In 2011, the researchers also went back and reevaluated the 154 playgrounds that had failed the 2010 survey. The study found that in playgrounds
with a loose-fill surface, most didn’t have the recommended 9 to 12 inches of fill in place. But nearly all of the playgrounds did have cover over the concrete footings used to secure playground equipment, and provided a 6-foot use zone of soft surfacing. Similarly, neighborhoods with a larger percentage of the population living below the poverty level had more failing playgrounds, and fewer playgrounds overall. Areas with more blacks had more failing playgrounds, and areas with more Hispanics had fewer playgrounds, according to the study. Study published in the February, 2013 print issue of Pediatrics. The National Football League commits $30 million donation to the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health to support medical research. The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH) announces that the National Football League (NFL) has agreed to donate $30 million in support of research on serious medical conditions prominent in athletes and relevant to the general population. This is the largest philanthropic gift the NFL has given in the league’s 92-year history. With this contribution, the NFL becomes the founding donor to a new Sports and Health Research Program, which will be conducted in collaboration with institutes and centers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Specific plans for the research to be undertaken remain to be developed, but potential areas under discussion include: chronic traumatic encephalopathy; concussion; understanding the potential relationship between traumatic brain injury and late life neurodegenerative disorders, especially Alzheimer’s disease; chronic degenerative joint disease; the transition from acute to chronic pain; sudden cardiac arrest in young athletes; and heat and hydration-related illness and injury. The FNIH hopes to welcome other donors, including additional sports
organizations, to the collaboration. Announcement published at www.ninds. nih.gov. NIH Conference investigates which neuroimaging tools and biomarkers show promise in diagnosing CTE A major focus of the conference was how the pathological features of CTE identified at autopsy could be correlated with imaging studies of autopsied brains. If correlations could be determined, the neuroimaging techniques could then be tested for their ability to diagnose CTE in living persons. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), a type of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) that reveals white matter tracts, shows promise for detecting CTE. Substantial technological improvements are needed before DTI is ready for routine clinical use, according to David Brody, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor of Neurology at Washington University School of Medicine. MRI studies also are complicated by the enormous amount of data collected, said Susumu Mori, Ph.D., Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Before DTI and other MRI techniques are applicable for assessing CTE in a living person, their accuracy and precision need to improve. Positron emission tomography, or PET scanning, is another imaging tool that shows promise for detecting CTE. PET scanning can map the location of particular molecules in the brain. Novel PET markers now are being validated to detect tau abnormalities associated with neurodegenerative disease, according to Hartmuth Kolb, Ph.D., Vice President of Biomarker Research at Siemens Healthcare. A PET marker that identifies the tau pathology of CTE in living individuals would constitute a major breakthrough in the field. Report on the Neuropathology of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy Workshop (December 5-6, 2012), National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, Sports and Health Research Program.
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