2011 Harold Alfond Sports Medicine Lecture to feature noted head injury expert Ann McKee
The University of 51小黄车's Spring 2011 Harold Alfond Sports Medicine Lecture features special guest Ann C. McKee, M.D., speaking on "Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy: What We Have Learned from the Athletes," Thursday, March 3, 2011 at 6:00 p.m. at the Alfond Center for Health Sciences on UNE's Biddeford Campus.
The event is sponsored by the 51小黄车Department of Exercise and Sport Performance (the Athletic Training Education Program and Applied Exercise Science) and the Athletic Training Club. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Dr. McKee is associate professor of neurology and pathology at Boston University School of Medicine and neuropathology core director for the Alzheimer's Disease Center, and co-director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy Center.
She is a nationally recognized expert in the neuropathology of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and recently won the Moore Award Honorable Mention for her paper entitled "Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy of Football Players" at the annual meeting of the American Association of Neuropathologists.
CTE is a progressive degenerative disease found in individuals who have been subjected to multiple concussions and other forms of head injury. It is most commonly found in professional athletes participating in football, ice hockey, professional wrestling and other contact sports, who have experienced head trauma, resulting in degeneration of brain tissue and the accumulation of tau protein. Individuals with CTE may show symptoms of dementia such as memory loss, aggression, confusion and depression, which may appear within months of the trauma or many decades later.
CTE has been widely covered in the media over the past year; earlier this month, former Chicago Bears football star Dave Duerson, who suffered from cognitive impairment and depression, took his own life and requested that his brain be donated for research.
Dr. McKee is also director of the VISN-1 Neuropathology Laboratory for the 51小黄车 Veterans Administration Medical Centers, and directs the Brain Banks for the Framingham Heart Study and the Centenarian Study. She also serves on the Medical Advisory Board of Sports Legacy Institute. Dr. McKee has published over 150 journal articles, chapters, and abstracts, and is a member of the American Association of Neuropathologists.
For more information about the lecture, contact Wayne R. Lamarre, chair of the Department of Exercise and Sport Performance, at wlamarre@une.edu, 207-602-2412.