INDIANAPOLIS — More than 60 researchers, sports medicine specialists and experts in concussion are gathering in Indianapolis this week to officially kick off one of the largest initiatives to study and prevent concussions.
With $30 million in funding from the NCAA and the Department of Defense, the Concussion Assessment, Research and Education Consortium will involve athletes from as many as 30 universities and be led by Indiana University School of Medicine, the University of Michigan and the Medical College of Wisconsin.
In announcing the three-year project in May, officials of the Defense Department and the NCAA, each of which will contribute $15 million, said their partnership reflects their mutual interest in improving prevention of and treatment for both college athletes and military service members.
This week’s meeting at the NCAA national office, which began Monday and will conclude Wednesday, will focus on the organizational, logistical and regulatory issues that the numerous institutions will need to resolve.
The leaders of the study, including Thomas McAllister, M.D., chairman of psychiatry at the IU School of Medicine, Steve Broglio, Ph.D., associate professor of kinesiology at the University of Michigan and Mike McCrea, Ph.D., professor of neurosurgery and neurology at the Medical College of Wisconsin, will be joined by other experts including Brian Hainline, M.D., chief medical officer of the NCAA, Walter Koroshetz, M.D., acting director for the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, and Col. Dallas Hack, brain health and fitness research coordinator for the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command.
Dr. McAllister said data collection has already begun for the project with the gathering of “baseline” data from athletes, data that will be used for comparison purposes with data gathered over the course of the project.