TheFrenzy
01-26-2020, 05:16 PM
"From scientist to salesman: How Bennet Omalu, doctor of ‘Concussion’ fame, built a career on distorted science" - WashingtonPost (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/sports/cte-bennet-omalu/?utm_source=reddit.com)
(You can get around WaPo's paywall by browsing in Incognito Mode.)
A few excerpts of the lengthy article:
In 2017, Bennet Omalu traveled the globe to accept a series of honors and promote his autobiography, “Truth Doesn’t Have A Side.” In a visit to an Irish medical school, he told students he was a “nobody” who “discovered a disease in America’s most popular sport.” In an appearance on a religious cable TV show, he said he named the disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, because “it sounded intellectually sophisticated, with a very good acronym.”
And since his discovery, Omalu told Sports Illustrated, researchers have uncovered evidence that shows adolescents who participate in football, hockey, wrestling and mixed martial arts are more likely to drop out of school, become addicted to drugs, struggle with mental illness, commit violent crimes and kill themselves.
A Ni#@ger#@ian American pathologist portrayed by Will Smith in the 2015 film, “Concussion,” Omalu is partly responsible for the most important sports story of the 21st century. Since 2005, when Omalu first reported finding widespread brain damage in a former NFL player, concerns about CTE have inspired a global revolution in concussion safety and fueled an ongoing existential crisis for America’s most popular sport. Omalu’s discovery — initially ignored and then attacked by NFL-allied doctors — inspired an avalanche of scientific research that forced the league to acknowledge a link between football and brain disease.
Nearly 15 years later, Omalu has withdrawn from the CTE research community and remade himself as an evangelist, traveling the world selling his frightening version of what scientists know about CTE and contact sports. In paid speaking engagements, expert witness testimony and in several books he has authored, Omalu portrays CTE as an epidemic and himself as a crusader, fighting against not just the NFL but also the medical science community, which he claims is too corrupted to acknowledge clear-cut evidence that contact sports destroy lives.
After more than a decade of intensive research by scientists from around the globe, the state of scientific knowledge of CTE remains one of uncertainty. Among CTE experts, many important aspects of the disease — from what symptoms it causes, to how prevalent or rare it is — remain the subject of research and debate.
But across the brain science community, there is wide consensus on one thing: Omalu, the man considered by many the public face of CTE research, routinely exaggerates his accomplishments and dramatically overstates the known risks of CTE and contact sports, fueling misconceptions about the disease, according to interviews with more than 50 experts in neurodegenerative disease and brain injuries, and a review of more than 100 papers from peer-reviewed medical journals.
Omalu did not discover CTE, nor did he name the disease. The alarming statistics he recites about contact sports are distorted, according to the author of the studies that produced those figures. And while Omalu cultivates a reputation as the global authority on CTE, it’s unclear whether he is diagnosing it correctly, according to several experts on the disease...
_____________________________
...Omalu’s fourth CTE type, which he called “incipient CTE,” is marked by “a combination of none to sparse” tau tangles in the cerebral cortex, brainstem and basal ganglia. Tau also can accumulate, in small amounts, in these areas through normal aging and other diseases.
Experts found Omalu’s fourth type nonsensical, noting that, as written, it suggested he would diagnose CTE in a brain with no tau.
“It sort of sounds like he’s saying, if you had someone who had a history of playing contact sports, it’s okay to diagnose them with CTE even if you don’t have any” tau, said Perl, an internationally known expert in brain diseases. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
In a deposition in 2018, Omalu displayed ambivalence when asked whether he followed the NIH guidelines. "The final decision is still with the doctor who is examining,” Omalu said. “Not every CTE case will have all those guidelines.”
McKee said she does not believe what Omalu calls “incipient CTE” is actually CTE. “His criteria for diagnosing CTE are all over the map,” McKee said. McKee and other experts in brain disease have held doubts about Omalu’s diagnostic methods since his first, and most famous, CTE paper...
_____________________________
... In Omalu’s words, CTE is an epidemic, a risk for anyone who plays any contact sport, at any level, and likely affecting every former NFL player.
“No single concussion is safe regarding the risk of developing gridiron dementia,” Omalu wrote in his first book, “Play Hard, Die Young.”
“I believe there is a very good chance that every person who plays (or has played or will play) in the NFL will suffer from some degree of CTE,” he wrote in “Truth Doesn’t Have A Side.”
In recorded medical literature, there are no documented cases of someone developing CTE from a single concussion. And while mounting scientific evidence suggests CTE is a significant risk for NFL players, studies examining groups of athletes who played other sports suggest it remains possible, if not likely, that Omalu is significantly overestimating the population potentially afflicted with CTE...
I just saw this and haven't dug into it yet, but thought others might be interested.
I don't know much about Will Hobson (the reporter here), but it looks like he won a Pulitzer for his reporting on abusive landlords and awful public housing conditions—so I doubt he's writing this in some attempt to defend the NFL.
(You can get around WaPo's paywall by browsing in Incognito Mode.)
A few excerpts of the lengthy article:
In 2017, Bennet Omalu traveled the globe to accept a series of honors and promote his autobiography, “Truth Doesn’t Have A Side.” In a visit to an Irish medical school, he told students he was a “nobody” who “discovered a disease in America’s most popular sport.” In an appearance on a religious cable TV show, he said he named the disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, because “it sounded intellectually sophisticated, with a very good acronym.”
And since his discovery, Omalu told Sports Illustrated, researchers have uncovered evidence that shows adolescents who participate in football, hockey, wrestling and mixed martial arts are more likely to drop out of school, become addicted to drugs, struggle with mental illness, commit violent crimes and kill themselves.
A Ni#@ger#@ian American pathologist portrayed by Will Smith in the 2015 film, “Concussion,” Omalu is partly responsible for the most important sports story of the 21st century. Since 2005, when Omalu first reported finding widespread brain damage in a former NFL player, concerns about CTE have inspired a global revolution in concussion safety and fueled an ongoing existential crisis for America’s most popular sport. Omalu’s discovery — initially ignored and then attacked by NFL-allied doctors — inspired an avalanche of scientific research that forced the league to acknowledge a link between football and brain disease.
Nearly 15 years later, Omalu has withdrawn from the CTE research community and remade himself as an evangelist, traveling the world selling his frightening version of what scientists know about CTE and contact sports. In paid speaking engagements, expert witness testimony and in several books he has authored, Omalu portrays CTE as an epidemic and himself as a crusader, fighting against not just the NFL but also the medical science community, which he claims is too corrupted to acknowledge clear-cut evidence that contact sports destroy lives.
After more than a decade of intensive research by scientists from around the globe, the state of scientific knowledge of CTE remains one of uncertainty. Among CTE experts, many important aspects of the disease — from what symptoms it causes, to how prevalent or rare it is — remain the subject of research and debate.
But across the brain science community, there is wide consensus on one thing: Omalu, the man considered by many the public face of CTE research, routinely exaggerates his accomplishments and dramatically overstates the known risks of CTE and contact sports, fueling misconceptions about the disease, according to interviews with more than 50 experts in neurodegenerative disease and brain injuries, and a review of more than 100 papers from peer-reviewed medical journals.
Omalu did not discover CTE, nor did he name the disease. The alarming statistics he recites about contact sports are distorted, according to the author of the studies that produced those figures. And while Omalu cultivates a reputation as the global authority on CTE, it’s unclear whether he is diagnosing it correctly, according to several experts on the disease...
_____________________________
...Omalu’s fourth CTE type, which he called “incipient CTE,” is marked by “a combination of none to sparse” tau tangles in the cerebral cortex, brainstem and basal ganglia. Tau also can accumulate, in small amounts, in these areas through normal aging and other diseases.
Experts found Omalu’s fourth type nonsensical, noting that, as written, it suggested he would diagnose CTE in a brain with no tau.
“It sort of sounds like he’s saying, if you had someone who had a history of playing contact sports, it’s okay to diagnose them with CTE even if you don’t have any” tau, said Perl, an internationally known expert in brain diseases. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
In a deposition in 2018, Omalu displayed ambivalence when asked whether he followed the NIH guidelines. "The final decision is still with the doctor who is examining,” Omalu said. “Not every CTE case will have all those guidelines.”
McKee said she does not believe what Omalu calls “incipient CTE” is actually CTE. “His criteria for diagnosing CTE are all over the map,” McKee said. McKee and other experts in brain disease have held doubts about Omalu’s diagnostic methods since his first, and most famous, CTE paper...
_____________________________
... In Omalu’s words, CTE is an epidemic, a risk for anyone who plays any contact sport, at any level, and likely affecting every former NFL player.
“No single concussion is safe regarding the risk of developing gridiron dementia,” Omalu wrote in his first book, “Play Hard, Die Young.”
“I believe there is a very good chance that every person who plays (or has played or will play) in the NFL will suffer from some degree of CTE,” he wrote in “Truth Doesn’t Have A Side.”
In recorded medical literature, there are no documented cases of someone developing CTE from a single concussion. And while mounting scientific evidence suggests CTE is a significant risk for NFL players, studies examining groups of athletes who played other sports suggest it remains possible, if not likely, that Omalu is significantly overestimating the population potentially afflicted with CTE...
I just saw this and haven't dug into it yet, but thought others might be interested.
I don't know much about Will Hobson (the reporter here), but it looks like he won a Pulitzer for his reporting on abusive landlords and awful public housing conditions—so I doubt he's writing this in some attempt to defend the NFL.