Neurological Foundation
Posted by Colin Lucas
Donation to Neurological Foundation.At our meeting on Tuesday a presentation was made from our Charitable Foundation to sue Giddens of the Neurological Foundation for $10,000.00.
Following receipt of the cheque sue gave us a brief update of the work of the Neurological Foundation and in particular a project that is being undertaken in conjunction with the Otago University looking into the ballistics of head injuries.
This is an important study as there is pretty solid evidence (anecdotal) that suggests that high impact sports such as rugby, league and in the US professional football leave players with significant neurological problems in later life.
The problem with research in this area is that for ethical and practical reasons it is not appropriate to use human volunteers in the project. There is understandable resistance to belting and being belted in the head with a baseball bat to see the effects of ballistic impacts on the human brain.
To get around this problem the researchers have built a anatomic model of the head with the same or similar consistencies of bone, tissue and brain tissue to examine the effects of impacts to the head. Within the model there are sensors which map the impacts.
The project is now underway so hopefully results will be presented next year.
In questions to Sue the comment was made that members of the Otago provincial rugby team are using mouth-guards with sensors in them so that there can be actual evidence of what happens when there are impacts.
Watch this space.