January 6, 2025 • 51 mins
In this eye-opening episode of Broken Brains with Bruce Parkman, host Bruce Parkman is joined by Dr. Michael Buckland, a leading expert on brain health, to explore the critical connections between repetitive head trauma (RHI), chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), and mental health. Together, they discuss the latest advancements in concussion protocols, the role of schools and society in protecting youth athletes, and the urgent need for awareness and prevention in contact sports.
Dr. Buckland delves into the challenges of diagnosing conditions like CTE and Traumatic Encephalopathy Syndrome (TES), particularly among young athletes and veterans. The discussion emphasizes the importance of prioritizing brain health, advocating for research into novel treatments, and fostering a proactive approach to reducing the long-term impact of contact sports on mental health. With suicide rates on the rise among athletes and veterans, this episode is a must-listen for parents, coaches, and anyone passionate about mental wellness and sports safety.
Stream the episode now on Spotify, YouTube, and Apple Podcasts. Don’t forget to follow, like, share, and subscribe to help spread awareness and support brain health initiatives!
Broken Brains with Bruce Parkman is sponsored by The Mac Parkman Foundation
Support The Mac Parkman Foundation by donating today!
https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=CR24MY2GDUCZL
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Repetitive Head Trauma
06:08 Concussion Protocols and Their Impact
12:01 The Role of Schools and Societal Attitudes
18:04 Coroner's Role in Understanding RHI
27:19 Understanding CTE and TES Diagnosis Challenges
33:44 Exploring Novel Treatments for Brain Injuries
39:04 The Impact of Contact Sports on Young Athletes
45:42 Future Directions in Brain Research and Treatment
Get the Head Smart App Today! Click the link below to download it now!
https://www.mpfact.com/headsmart-app/
Connect Dr. Buckland today!
LinkedIn: Michael Buckland
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-buckland-89302a2a/
Website: brainbank.org.au
X: @drmbuckland
https://x.com/drmbuckland?lang=en
Produced by Security Halt Media
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Hey folks, bruce Parkman here with Broken Brains,
sponsored by the Mack ParkmanFoundation, where we focus on
the issue of repetitive headtrauma and from our repetitive
head impacts and repetitiveblast exposure for our veterans
and what this type of trauma isdoing to the brains of so many
people in our population kids,adults, veterans and how we need
(00:35):
to make better choices and bebetter educated on the impacts
of sports and military trainingon these brains, the resulting
epidemic of mental illness andwhat can be done about it.
So every week we reach out toresearchers, scientists,
professional athletes, kids,parents to bring you the latest
information we can so you caneducate yourself, because this
is a relatively unknownphenomenon in our medical
(00:57):
psychological communities andyou need to be informed in order
to best protect those that youlove.
Today we've got another amazingguest, dr Michael Butlin, who
we know is the Anne McKee ofDown Under man.
This man is amazing.
I'm so excited about this, buthe is a senior neuropathologist
(01:18):
and head of the Department ofNeuropathology at the Royal
Prince Alfred Hospital and thehead of molecular neuropathology
program at the Braid and MindCenter at the University of
Sydney, and he's also theco-director of the Multiple
Sclerosis Research AustraliaBrain Bank.
He's one of the most pronouncedneuropathologists in the world.
If you've ever seen his TEDTalk that he's done on
(01:38):
repetitive head impact and itsrelationship to rugby, which is
basically original, please lookup that video.
You have to see that becauseonce I saw it, I reached out to
Dr Buckland in a heartbeatbecause nobody's talking about
this issue and espoused it sowell Dr Buckland, how you been
sir.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Very well, thank you, bruce.
Yeah, nice to see you again.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Good to see you again , sir.
So what's going on down under?
Uh, you know, I got my, my acdchat on.
I do play bagpipes in acdc band, so very excited, uh, you know,
to get, uh, to get catch backup with you and and see what's
going on in the world of rhi andrbe down under sir yeah, thank
you.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yes, well, I mean, for for us Christmas time is our
summer holidays, so, uh,generally the whole of Australia
shuts down for most of January.
Yes, sir, right at the beach.
So, uh, when I'm lookingforward to having some some time
off in the sun very shortly.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, that's right.
It's kind of reversed downthere with the summer months and
coming up.
I remember when I used to havemy company down in Canberra, I
always try to reach my employees, you know, after the Christmas
holidays, because in Americawe're idiots about work.
So we're back at work January3rd and it took me two years to
(03:07):
realize that that was just awaste of time, that nobody's
going to answer the phone in.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
January down in Australia.
Pretty much, yeah, it's prettymuch.
Get on it, man.
Sorry, I'll just get rid ofthat Look.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
I apologize for that.
Ah, don't worry about it, sir.
So what's been going on?
Have you been doing moreadditional research on the area?
I mean, we're seeing a lot ofissues coming out.
There's a lot of progress beingmade with the issue of kids in
contact sports and repetitiveimpacts, particularly in the AFL
(03:35):
down under.
So what are we doing?
I think things might be movingthe needle a little bit down
there.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Yes, look, I think it's been a remarkable few years
.
We've really seen.
Really, when we started offwith the Australian Sports Brain
Bank, we were told that, yeah,australian sports were different
.
This disease didn't exist downhere, it's an American
footballer's disease and youknow, within six years we've
(04:03):
seen that there's now been afederal government Senate
inquiry into concussions andrepeated head trauma in sports.
That came out with some reallystrong findings, which was great
, and probably the mostimportant one was that the
federal government Senateacknowledged the causal
(04:24):
relationship between exposure torepetitive head impacts and the
development of CTE.
Really.
So we've actually got agovernmental acknowledgement now
and in that inquest we did seeboth the AFL, australian Wolves
Football and the National RugbyLeague or the NRL, both
(04:44):
acknowledging that link whenpressed by the Senators.
So it's been quite remarkableto get that sort of on record
that now the major contactsports in Australia have
acknowledged a link betweenexposure to repeated head
impacts and CTE.
I mean that's.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
No well, I mean, the AFL have now, in fact, through
the Australian Institute ofSport, another governmental
agency has now indicated changedtheir concussion guidelines so
that there's a minimumthree-week stand down for a
concussion now, and I think whenwe started it was six days.
So we've certainly seen themmoving a lot, which is
(05:29):
absolutely fantastic.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Yeah, as you say down in Australia, bloody hell.
I mean that's amazing.
I mean to have.
So what has that done?
Now that they've done that,that you've recognized because
we still have a long way to goup here that link has been
recognized.
What does it has?
What has that done for thesport themselves?
Because just changing theconcussion protocols doesn't do
(05:53):
anything about changing ourexposure, which is, we know, is
the cause of CTE and everythingelse that we're talking about.
It all comes down to our HI.
So have they made any changes?
I mean what I'm following onTwitter and stuff I haven't
everybody's upset about thesered cards and you know 20 minute
stand downs and stuff like that, but that is an amazing
(06:15):
movement.
Were you part of the inquirythat got that going, sir?
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Oh, yes, I certainly gave evidence at the inquiry,
but I think, like most thingsyou know, they don't really care
about a doctor's opinion.
It was hearing from thefamilies of those that had died
from CTE.
I think that really, really puta rocket under the senators and
made them realize this was aproblem that affected everyday
(06:42):
people.
So, yes, yes, and look, there'sdefinitely more work to be done
.
As you said, cte is a problemof exposure to repeated head
impacts.
The codes, often in their publiccommunication, still conflate
the issue of concussion with theissue of CTE.
(07:05):
So they'll often say this iswe've got the best concussion
protocols in the world, and Idon't know if that's a
deliberate conflation or don'tquite get it.
I'm not sure.
But there's been other thingsas well, actually.
(07:26):
So, following on from thatSenate inquiry the Royal College
of Pathologists of Australasia,which is obviously the medical
college that I'm part of theyreleased a position statement on
CTE, also confirming the causalrelationship and calling for
specific CTE preventionprotocols.
(07:47):
In addition to concussionguidelines, there should be
specific protocols and policiesaround CTE prevention.
So that is something we'restill pushing now and, as you
know, the Concussion LegacyFoundation did release the first
(08:08):
ever CTE prevention protocol ayear or two ago and we certainly
contributed to that.
That was led by Dr ChrisNowinski from BU and CLF, bu and
CLF, and so we're certainlytrying to encourage sports to
(08:29):
look at that and to take up thatprotocol.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
And what are the primary points of that protocol
that you can share with us?
Is there anything aboutdelaying exposure, or is it, you
know, just being more educatedon the issue of RHI, and is RHI
even a part of those protocols?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yes, very much focused on RHI and not
concussions.
It does include, you know,reference to age of first
exposure.
Exposure seems to be importantwith severity of symptoms later
in life.
So it does include delayingexposure to RHI through contact
(09:14):
sports until children are inhigh school, which is usually
about 13 or so.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yeah, 13, 14.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Yeah, yeah wow, and also just the cumulative
exposure.
So very similar to what you'veprobably got.
In the US, there'srecommendations around limiting
full contact training during theweek, particularly in a
professional game, and that'sactually recently.
(09:42):
The National Rugby LeaguePlayers Association have come
out and requested that and saidwhy aren't we doing this?
They're doing this in the US,why aren't we doing this here?
Which again, I think is areally positive move.
We're now starting to see theplayers say hang on a second, we
want to look after our brains,which I think is terrific.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
It absolutely is.
I mean, here in America, youknow, we know that the NFL has
no contact drills for the mostpart during the season and some
of our Ivy League colleges havedone that because of their focus
on, you know, finally sayinghey, academics is why we're here
, right, Not playing contactsports.
But when it gets to the highschools, we have nothing.
90 something percent, if notall high schools have contact
(10:30):
practice during the week andwhen we explain to them that the
NFL doesn't do it, they justdon't care.
They say, well, kids need tolearn how to tackle Tackle's
partly in the game.
I said, well then they shouldn'tbe playing the game.
I said, well then theyshouldn't be playing the game if
it's going to be damaging theonly organ that's going to get
them through life.
So where can this take us?
Like down in Australia?
(10:50):
That's an amazing developmentand for the national, the
leagues, they're understandingnow that you know their players
are their money or that is thesport.
We have to take care of them.
But are we seeing any impactfurther downstream, with the
high schools down under?
Because it sounds like we'vegot a lot to learn from the
Australians when it comes tocontact sports with this kind of
(11:12):
progress at these legislativelevels and professional levels.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, well, look, I don't want to paint too rosy a
picture.
I still think we've got a longway to go down here as well as
you do, but we've had a coupleof high schools private high
schools withdraw from contactsports competitions because of
(11:39):
this issue, but that's only beena handful.
It's definitely still a problemin high schools and, as you say
, they're the institutions youtrust your children's brain
development with, essentially,so to have them not really jump
(12:01):
on this does concern me andhopefully we'll see that change.
Um, uh, it is.
Yes, I mean it's probably likein in the us as well.
Some.
There are scholarships toprestigious high schools and
scholarships to universitiesbased on your sporting prowess.
(12:24):
So it is a pathway for peoplethat may be socioeconomically
disadvantaged.
There's a clear pathway forthem to get into the best school
and the best university byplaying footy.
So I can understand theattraction from individuals, but
(12:47):
certainly we need to do moreand I'm not sure what it's like
in the US, but it's quitecommonly.
The rate of suicide, deaths bysuicide in young people is quite
commonly talked about in thepress and by the government.
(13:10):
We're investing millions andmillions of dollars into the
issue, but I'm yet to see any ofthose conversations reference
RHI or concussions Reference RHIall concussions.
It's just not part of theequation, which seems to me a
(13:33):
huge oversight, since we'reessentially paying to inflict
these injuries on our childrenand then we're paying to clean
up afterwards when they havemental health issues or,
tragically, take their own life.
Health issues or or, or youknow, tragically take their own
life.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Uh, so yes, go yeah, no, I mean, we got the same.
You know I argue with peopleall the time oh, that's our,
that's my way out of the hood,is what how?
It's always put up here and myin my conversations with them I
always tell them.
I always tell people look, your, your child has a better chance
of becoming an accountant, adoctor or a lawyer than they do
(14:11):
playing professional sports.
Okay, yeah, they might not geta free ride to school, but there
are other ways to get freerides to school and if
endangering your child's brainhealth is going to be one of
them number one, you betterstart them really late because
in my professional opinion, drButlin, as a semi-pro rugby
player, you cannot stop naturaltalent.
If you're going to play in theAFL or NFL or the NRL, you're
destined in early life, when youjust got the gift.
(14:34):
And we tell people all the time.
Some of our NFL players didn'tstart playing football until
they were 16.
Like they were a junior lasttwo years of school and because
they were that good, they justran over everybody and just
walked right into college andwent on to play the NFL.
And the other side that we havehere is that our sports leagues
, especially in the NFL, we knowis just horrific when these
(14:58):
players leave the system and therates of financial destitution
and mental health are throughthe roof.
I personally know of a coach ofan NFL team.
He's an NFL player.
He's got four NFL players onhis staff, all of them including
himself all with severe mentalhealth issues, all from the
years of dedication.
(15:19):
See your point.
You know we're paying thesekids to go to school, but on the
other end, you know here we are.
You know we're paying thesekids to go to school, but on the
other end, you know here we are.
So it sounds like you downunder have the same problems
with suicide issues that we havein America.
It's a huge problem up here.
I mean the level of young peoplethat just don't want to be here
anymore or that end up in jailare not there, and I think it
(15:42):
all has to do with prioritizingbrain health.
Give me your opinion on this.
Like when I go to the doctor,they check my heart, they listen
to my lungs, they smack me inthe knee, but nobody has ever
asked me.
You know how's your brain doing.
You know what's going on upthere.
Have you taken any knocks?
You know?
I do think that if we couldprioritize brain health, we
(16:04):
could get a better sense ofbrain awareness and brain.
You know, I do think that if wecould prioritize brain health,
we could get a better sense ofbrain awareness and brain.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
You know, just you know, you know, understanding
how important this organ is tous, where we might take a second
look at letting Junior playfooty at, you know, at 10 years
old yes, yes, I um, I oftenwonder what, uh, like, uh, when
our grandkids are adults, ifthey look back and think, oh my
god, what the hell were thosepeople in you know 2024 doing to
(16:34):
their kids.
You know, and I probably willtake that generational change to
to really start to appreciatehow important our brain health
is and we face the same problem.
It is because I do a lot of notonly with the Sports Brain Bank
, I also do a lot of work forthe New South Wales State,
(16:58):
coroner, which is New SouthWales is the state that I'm in
in Sydney and it's the largestpot bite population state in
Australia and we get a lot ofbrains through there as well.
But what we never get is everis a history of contact sports.
So it might be a history ofdrug and alcohol use or it might
(17:19):
be a history of overseas travelor vaccination history, all
that sort of social historywhich is routinely collected in
a medical examination, but nevercontact sports history.
And in fact that was one of therecommendations from the Royal
College of Pathologists that ahistory of contact sports and
(17:40):
other TBI exposure be part ofevery medical history taking.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
So I agree completely , yes, sir, and I think it
should be part of everybodythat's going into incarceration
as well.
I think that if we addressbrain health as a societal issue
, like we prioritize this, likewe're prioritizing suicide or
drug abuse or a teenagepregnancy, prioritizing suicide
(18:09):
or drug abuse or a teenagepregnancy, we could change the,
the, the, the.
There's so many social illshere that have now now, are now
to be understood, or could havebeen, you know, you know, caused
by repetitive head impact.
The only reason I'm talking toyou, doctor, is that when my son
took his life, um, and I waited, you know three months, the
coroner finally gave us theautopsy.
He's like, mr Parkman, I'msorry your son took his life.
(18:30):
I'm like, wow.
I said why.
I want you to explain why myson, who was loved, never abused
, you know, believed in our Lord, went to a private school, had
a, you know, a used car, youknow skied, went on vacations,
was loved more than anythingthat I could do.
I loved that boy Everything.
His family loved him, everybodyloved him.
He's just, you know, a thousandpeople showed up to his service
(18:51):
.
I said why is he not here?
You know what he told me.
He said did your son playcontact sports.
That one sentence changed mylife and I said what do you?
I said, of course he's anAmerican kid.
He played contact sports.
(19:11):
He played rugby, played hockey,played soccer, he played
football, he played wrestling,he played anything he wanted to
play.
What's that got to do with thefact that he's dead?
That is what got me talking toyou and Dr McKee, because he
said I.
He said have you heard aboutCTE?
I'm like the football disease.
He goes yeah, he says I triedto do a scan but I don't have
the equipment, and that alonesent me on this journey.
But to your point, dr Buckle,the majority of our coroners are
(19:34):
like our psychologists, likeour nurses and, like our doctors
, are completely untrained onthe issue or the correlation
between RHI and contact sports,damaged brains and mental
illness, and so when suicideshappen, this is not even on the
radar.
Now, I'm not asking to put anumber out there at all, but I
(19:54):
do think there might be astatistically significant amount
of these suicides that have a.
You know, given the number ofpeople that play contact sports,
I don't think you're, I thinkyou're going to find a
significant amount of thesebrains that at least have had
some exposure.
Now the amount of exposure thatcould have, you know, like,
according to the TES protocols,whatever you know caused them to
(20:15):
be damaged.
But I mean, I think that Ithink that you're onto something
.
What would be the path thatwe're trying to figure this out
in America?
What would be the path thatwe're trying to figure this out
in America?
What would be the path?
Think of all the families thatcould have some closure.
Like, I had closure.
I could understand.
You know, I didn't want tounderstand why my son might not
(20:36):
be here.
Okay, brain damage Now I knowwhat.
He wasn't crazy, he wasn'tcaught up in drugs or porn or
Satan or whatever.
My son had a brain injury.
Okay, that gives us someclosure.
These families deserve thatkind of closure.
What do you think it would taketo make that kind of awareness?
You know, like part of cornertraining, or you know certified
medical education credits oranything like that.
(20:57):
How do we get there?
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, look, I'm with you all the way.
I wonder how big the problem is.
I don't know.
I don't have any statistics,but it does worry me, like it
worries you.
How many of these youngsuicides are due to exposure to
this RHI and mild traumaticbrain injury?
We have no idea.
(21:21):
We have no idea.
I've been working because I havethe relationship with the New
South Wales state coroner.
I have been working with thecoroners across the country to
try and educate them at theirannual meeting.
(21:41):
I've presented several times onthe issue and I actually feel
like things are starting tochange a little bit, in that
when we first started the BrainBank down here very much, I was
often on the phone callingfamilies asking them if they
(22:03):
would consider donating theirloved ones' brains.
But the last few years it'schanged, whereas now we're
getting calls and it's eitherfrom families or, in a not
insignificant number of times,it's from a coroner or a
coronial liaison officer fromthe coroner's office.
Um, this case uh, um, you know,may be of interest to you or it
(22:29):
may, uh, the family have hadasked.
So we're happy to help with, um, you know, retrieving this
brain donation.
So that has changed a littlebit.
Um, it's we really.
I don't know what it's like inthe us, but in australia, um
again, all that coroner'slegislation is state by state.
(22:52):
We don't have some overarchingnational you only.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
You only have seven states down there.
We got 50 and they all don'tget along.
So, yeah, I got it.
I like that.
No, but good point, sir, goodpoint.
Yeah, we got 50 and they alldon't get along.
So, yeah, I got it.
No, but good point, sir, goodpoint.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Yeah, but almost all of the state-based legislation
has this clause in the coroner'spowers saying that the coroner
must determine the cause andmanner of death in the least
invasive way possible.
So many coroners feel that thatrestricts their ability to go
(23:34):
investigating, say, thepossibility of brain disease in
young suicide people, becausethey decide that the cause and
manner of death is alreadyevident.
You know this personunfortunately hung himself.
He had a history of mentalhealth problems.
It was a suicide note.
There's no suspiciouscircumstances.
(23:55):
I don't need to look at thisperson's brain, which is, I mean
, I think it's a good there'sobviously that was put in for
good intentions, but I think ithas unintended negative
consequences.
Now it's like the coronerscan't necessarily follow their
gut instinct and go and look atthat person's brain because the
(24:17):
legislation says you need to doit in the least invasive way
possible.
So that's something again,hopefully that may change in the
least invasive way possible.
So that's something that worksagain.
Hopefully that may change inthe future.
But it's an issue.
I'm sorry now I've forgottenyour question completely.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
No, no, that was it.
It's like you know, how do weget these coroners to understand
that there could be an issue?
And if they're collecting thedata that would indicate the
possibility of an RHI-related,you know mental illness or
suicide is high, then they havethe duty to investigate for the
family.
But you know, we also have toeducate the families on this,
(24:57):
because you know, most families,if their loved ones you know
their kids or their spouse,takes their life, they have
absolutely no clue that theirhistory of RHI, you know, no
matter how, it's induced throughmilitary service, domestic
abuse or whatever, or contactsports, especially contact
sports, because we're groomed tothink that these sports are
(25:19):
innocuous, right, they're safe.
You know, let's just go play.
Right, let's go, come on, comeon, six year old has a helmet,
let's go out there.
You know, we're groomed, sothen we don't question, we don't
even think that they could berelated where I think, if we
raise the possibility of doubtin the public's mind that hey,
there is a link here.
And I and you know when, when I, when my son passed, I was
(25:41):
going to do anything to get tothe bottom of this, I didn't
care, I didn't care if I went tojail man.
I found out that he was gettingdrugs to deal with his
schizophrenia from the footballteam.
They broke into our house.
I mean we had massive criminalcase going on.
But you know, when a parent'sin that position man, they're
(26:02):
going to do anything they can toget to the bottom.
But I think that's going to bea great and that's something
that we could definitely worktogether on.
Let's talk a little bit aboutthe old in vivo diagnosis.
There's this holy grail thateverybody's looking for the
biomarkers and the blood plasmathings and all that.
And we have this set ofprotocols in the US called
(26:23):
traumatic encephalopathysyndrome protocols.
Right, these were approved byNINDS not yet validated, but
approved as a screening tool.
Right, to either provide adiagnosis that could be then
substantiated with, you know,brain scans, and then you know
some other.
You know tests whatever.
We got blood tests, right.
(26:44):
But where are we at with that?
Because we don't have the meansyet.
I mean, we have the ability tounderstand in the research
community and in poorly educatedpeople like myself that this is
an issue, but at the same timewe have a diagnosis tool that
could be easily implemented.
Any parent could ask those fourquestions.
(27:05):
Right.
Where do you think we couldtake that in the community
Australia, uk, america, contactSportsville, right.
What could we do with that?
Because I do believe that thatcould be one of the answers in
terms of, you know, evaluatingand diagnosing mental illness
while the child is still alive.
(27:25):
So we can get ahead of this byassessing the history of RHI.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Oh gee, that's a good question.
So we know with the originalTES criteria that they
definitely cast a very wide netand even though lots of people
satisfied those criteria whenthey went to validate the first
(27:52):
bunch of them, it was only onein five ended up having a
pathological diagnosis of CTE.
And, as you said, we're stillwaiting for how the revised
criteria are going to perform.
I think it's hard when you speakto a pathologist, I think in
(28:15):
that, while definitely I meanCTE, the clinical diagnostics
are not reliable yet at all.
So aware that in fact, most ofthe degenerative brain diseases,
(28:39):
the clinicians are notparticularly good at diagnosing
it during life, and it may wellbe that they diagnose the one
pathology, but when you look atthe brain, there's two other
pathologies going on as well.
So it's not something that'snecessarily restricted to CTE or
TES, but it's certainlyprobably because it's only 15 or
(29:03):
20 years since we've startedlooking at CTE and TES, so there
hasn't been that large body ordepth of research over many
decades, which is probably whywe're a little bit behind
compared to other degenerativebrain diseases, and that's yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
I mean all good points, but my point is, doctor,
when we have a kid that hasmental illness, we can err on
the side of caution because thetreatment, even if you
misdiagnose TES, the worst thingyou're going to do is not play
contact sports and beat yourhead up.
Right, we're going to say don'tplay contact sports and then
over time it becomes all right,you go back and I'm sorry, I
wrecked your foodie career atthe age of eight Go play.
(29:44):
You know whatever I mean.
So that's that was our point isthat, look, you know, we might
not be able to diagnose it, butat least we're evaluating a
potential cause and we'reeliminating one of the key
factors that could becontributing to the problem.
And on the side of caution,we're talking about kids with
mental illness, if you know, weat least err on the side of
(30:07):
caution and the remedy is notpills or chemotherapy or
medication.
It's don't play contact sports.
I'm sorry you're going to playyour medication.
It's don't play contact sports.
I'm sorry.
You're going to play baseball.
You're going to you, just don'tplay rugby.
You play touch rugby or soccer.
You know, even soccer, withouthitting the ball, can be a safe
sport.
I mean, that's where we're kindof I'm going with that and is
(30:28):
like you know, it's the samething with repetitive blast
exposure in our veterans, oursuicide rates.
Here we've lost 20 times theamount of kids that died in
combat to mental illness andsuicide.
We have no idea where braindamage is involved in that
number of suicides and wehaven't screened for that
(30:49):
because we just don't do it yet.
It's just becoming a.
You know, paul Scanlon downunder, I don't know if you know
Paul, paul and I go way back,good man, he's got he's on a one
man crusade down there rightnow on this whole RBE thing.
And, and I just think, when itcomes to mental illness, you
know, you know we're we'retalking about modalities that
are not covered by insurance,treatment that could help out.
(31:12):
So, yeah, yeah I, I think thatyou know, you know when, if we
don't have an in vivo diagnosis,doing something, whether than
just, you know, not, educatingour you know, our scientific, uh
or our medical community wouldbe better than nothing.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Look, I take, I take your point.
I think you're absolutely right.
Uh, in a way, if you can takeTES or whatever away from CTE,
because it actually doesn'treally matter what the
underlying pathology is, itdoesn't, sir, if they're
symptomatic and you think it'sdue to taking too many knocks to
(31:50):
the head.
So I agree, that's a verypragmatic approach.
Is that you should be thinking,hang on, yeah, they do satisfy
these criteria.
Let's pull them out of footyfor a year or two and see how
they go.
People doubles their risk ofsuicide.
There's 40% increase in novelneuropsychiatric disorders in
(32:19):
young people after a singleconcussion.
So there's fairly good evidenceout there that it's not just a
CTE thing, it's a brain traumathing.
So, yeah, I agree with youentirely.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
In conversations.
I was talking to Bob Stern andhe, at the end of his career, he
said Bruce, I don't think TESis related to CTE.
Tes in and of itself is anissue.
It's a diagnosis, it is acondition.
Now, over time, those samefactors that led to a TES
diagnosis would absolutely leadto a CTE diagnosis post mortem.
(32:54):
But you know it was.
He was becoming, you know,aligned with you on that point.
That TES, or, you know, whateverwe're going to call it, is not
CTE.
It is a separate diagnosticcondition as a result of RHI
that then can be treated If wecan find it in life.
I mean, I mean, dr Buckland,what we're coming across now to
(33:14):
treat the brain in America,since my son is left between
brain supplementation programsand all these technical
modalities like TMS andphotobiomodulation and
hyperbaric oxygen therapy, vagusnerve stimulation, then the
whole psychedelics side of thisis all providing enormous relief
(33:35):
and improvement in all keycognitive, behavioral,
psychological areas for veteransand for professional athletes
that are trying these, you know,but here in the US none of them
are covered by insurance.
I mean, that's our big, that'sone of our challenges right now.
We don't have billing codes.
Where do you think the frontieris in this space around the
(33:55):
world.
You know where we can.
You know, once we have a brainthat's been damaged by RHR, what
are you seeing as some of thenovel approaches to treating
that brain, besides the approachof drugs and therapy, which is
not helping our veteranpopulation at all?
That's all we have.
For 20 years later, we're stilldoing drugs and therapy and
guess what?
We still got a suicide level.
(34:18):
That's unacceptable.
It's not even close to dropping.
So we got to do somethingdifferent.
We have to think outside thebox.
What are you seeing in terms ofthe research on the treatment
side with brain health thatmight be coming about that can
help those that are affected?
Speaker 2 (34:35):
that might be coming about that can help those that
are affected.
Look, I guess as a pathologist,I'm not an expert in that area.
Okay, fair enough.
I would say that we don't yetunderstand all.
The CGE is easy to see, butthere's other pathologies in the
brain which we are not good atseeing even under the microscope
(34:58):
, and we need to understand howto quantify changes in white
matter integrity and bloodvessels.
And I think there's a lot more.
That's probably right there infront of our eyes, but because
we don't have the knowledge baseto see it, we're not seeing it,
we're not counting it.
(35:18):
I agree, though, that there doesseem to be an explosion in all
these treatments.
I don't know how many of themhave put through clinical trials
and shown positive results.
Theoretically, I love the ideaof hyperbaric oxygen.
I don't know if it works or not, but intuitively I'm drawn to
(35:41):
that.
I'm drawn to that TMS as atherapy.
I think that's definitely gotenough buzz about it that it
needs to be tested in properclinical trials, and I'm sure,
with psychedelics and otherdrugs, there's probably going to
(36:02):
be some good treatments inthere as well.
What I also wonder about isthat it might be.
You know, there's CTE.
There might be another form ofmild TBI that's mostly white
matter injury.
There might be another formwhich is a mixture of white
matter and blood vessel injury,and maybe, in fact, in 20 years'
(36:25):
time, we'll be talking aboutthe eight different subtypes and
maybe each one will have adifferent treatment.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
And each one will have been caused by repetitive
head impact in contact sports,which is what the audience needs
to understand.
It's.
You know this doesn't happen.
This doesn't have to happen,you know so.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
But it might be that just because something doesn't
now doesn't work in a clinicaltrial, it's because we're
lumping people with actually alleight different variants into
one bucket and testing them andit might be that one of those
eight you know variants of tesresponds really well to
psychedelic therapy.
But you won't see that signalbecause it's diluted out with
(37:08):
all the other um one.
So often when people ask melook if something's working for
you, that's, that's the mostimportant thing.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
Uh yeah that's a key point.
That's a key point.
That um did you uh.
So how big is your brain bankright now?
How many uh brain?
I know you're one of the newest, newer brain banks for sports,
right.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Yes, I think we launched in 2018.
Okay, I didn't have any greyhair in 2018.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
They're wearing you out, man.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Great journey.
We're up to 130 brains donatednow, which you know Australia
has a population of 25 million,so it's probably the size of one
of your states.
So yeah, in that populationbase I think we've done very
well, absolutely.
(38:05):
We're just crunching the numberon our first, all the numbers,
on our first 99 brains, and Ithink we, for the first time,
being able to independentlyreplicate some of the findings
from the BU team in terms of,but in an Australian context.
So with Australian contactsports, there does seem to be a
(38:30):
relationship between astatistically significant
relationship between number ofyears played and CTE risk.
So validating those sort ofobservations in a local context,
I think it's really importantand does give more power to the
arguments that hang on.
This is something that we needto be concerned about.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Yeah, I don't know if you know that study that we
funded we helped fund with AnneMcKee that study that was
released last August where we wegot Dr McKee's team to look at
the under 30 brains and theyevaluated them means of death,
and that study I'm sure youmight have seen it, but 40% of
(39:20):
those 162 brains all under 30,had CTE.
100% of those brains hadstructural integrity damage to
them, 100% of those brains wereassociated with severe cognitive
, psychological and behavioraldisorders and 80% of them died
by suicide or overdose.
So I mean I would love to seeif that type of study could be
(39:41):
replicated down under when you,even at whatever level of brains
that you have, because I thinkthat will only lend credence,
because the only commondenominator across those brains
was a history of contact sports,rhi, and I think that can, you
know, help.
I mean we're learning from younow.
I mean, on the veteran side, Iheard that we're way ahead of
(40:03):
the Australians on, you know,veterans legislation stuff.
But with some of these momentsthat you've mentioned, we
desperately need to get there inAmerica and I mean it's just
amazing to hear some of theprogress and I don't think the
lawsuits have hurt either.
There's some I mean massivelitigation going on in the UK
(40:24):
and Europe right now, and Ithink there might be some going
on in Australia, if I'm notmistaken.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
It's looming.
Yes, I think that there is abig class action which has been
filed but is yet to start orcommence.
However, that works in thelegal setting.
But, yeah, look, we're seeingthat very disturbing association
, I think, of our brains withCTE.
It's about 48% died fromsuicide and compared to, you
(40:55):
know, 20% or less than peoplethat didn't have CTE.
And, uh, if you look at justthe young people, that
percentage goes, goes evenhigher, over 50%, which is
definitely concerning.
Uh, it's, it's, um.
We have a yeah, I am aware ofthat paper and I got to say that
(41:16):
um, and usually, if I thinkI've had a bright idea, I then
find out Anne McKee thought ofit two years earlier, which is
she's really ahead of the game.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
We pushed her pretty hard on that one and that
started with my son's brain whenI asked her, because I ended up
writing the book and I wantedto know what was in there, and
so we put together you know wewere part of the funding but
yeah, she did an amazing job andto see where that could go, if
(41:47):
that, if that, if that, you know, study helps you in any way.
You know we can.
There's more to be done, right,but the the, the bottom line is
you know RHI, you know it hasto.
Rhi and brain health have tobecome, you know a more I don't
know what you say just a moreaccepted part of how we talk
about contact sports, becauseyou know it's producing a lot of
(42:11):
carnage, as we both well know.
You're on the other side of it.
So what?
Yeah, go ahead, what?
So what?
Speaker 2 (42:19):
what?
Yeah, good, yeah, I would loveyou know, ideally, and I'd
probably be shot down in flamesfor this, but you know, we are a
country of 25 million, whyaren't we looking at every
single brain of people thatcommit suicide?
If it's such a nationalemergency, why aren't we looking
(42:40):
at the brains of the peoplethat commit suicide?
I mean, I would love to be ableto say we will take anyone's
brain that commits suicide forthe next three years and we
might get a lot of brains.
But that's okay.
I think it needs to be done.
It needs to be looked at insuch a way.
(43:01):
I mean, you're never going toget it completely unbiased, but
even if it's like we don't careif you've played sports or if
you don't know if that personplayed sports, let's just look
at them.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Let's just look at them?
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Yeah, because we're not looking.
It's the most complex organ wehave and all these people have
mental health issues.
No one cares about looking attheir brains.
It just to me seems outrageous,and I think our understanding
of brain disease it's probablytoday is like our understanding
(43:35):
of cancer in like 1985.
Yeah, we're that far behind andwe've seen all the explosions
in cancer treatments, many ofwhich are based on understanding
what's going on in the tissue,and that's going to be even more
so, even more relevant, when itcomes to brain health and
(43:56):
problems with thinking and moodand behavior.
So there's a lot to be done,yeah, but I'm with you 100%
there.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
No, I mean, but with cancer we don't have, you know,
an entire subset of ourpopulation, professional sports,
all this money pushing backagainst treatments that can
improve, because we'll have tounderstand and recognize that
we've had an impact on brainsand now we just have to make it
right.
I mean, nobody needs to pointfingers, nobody needs to write
big checks.
All we got to do as a societyis say, look, now we have this
(44:28):
knowledge, now we understandthis.
I mean, honestly, dr Buckland,in that study, with 40% of those
kids having CTE.
One of the reasons that we'renow finding CTE, in my
perspective, in people in their20s and 30s is because back in
the 70s and 80s and 60s, kidsdidn't put helmets on at six
(44:48):
years old, right?
And so you know, we have muchlonger exposure rates as
children.
That, I think, is driving theseyou know, skyrocketing rates,
you know.
You know skyrocketing 40% ofthese brains having CTE in their
20s and under 30, all of themunder 30, 40% of them.
And so that comes to how weplay contact sports and how do
(45:10):
we make better decisions.
And that's why, man, I keepgoing back to your, your TED
talk, man, that was.
You put that out so eloquentlyand and it was just, it was and
it was just so heartwarming tohear somebody say this with your
background that we have toaddress RHI If we're going to
(45:31):
continue as a society and say welove our kids and we love our
sports, without addressing this,we're going to continue to have
, you know, massive amounts oftragedy, massive amounts of
heartbreak and so on and soforth.
So so, what are you working onnow?
How do people find you?
I mean, I definitely you knowwe're going to hang the, the,
(45:53):
the, the link to your Ted talkon the on the podcast and we we
go.
But what are you working on now, dr Buckland, and how can
people follow your work?
Are you on, you know, socialmedia or you know?
How do people follow what youwork?
Because your opinion, yourperspective here in America is
so important to the populationthat we're trying to address
(46:15):
medical researchers and parents.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
Oh, thank you.
Look at the moment.
I've actually taken a breakfrom social media.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
I don't blame you.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
I'm feeling better for it as well.
So we're yet to have asignificant social media
presence, but our website's verysimple.
It's just wwwbrainbankorgau.
Uh, so it's just brainbankorgau.
Um, uh, if once we do start toget more of a fraud facing role
(46:54):
I mean, I've been trying to tellChris Nominski he's got to come
down here and start, you know,cracking heads in Australian
media to uh media to get theexposure.
Speaker 1 (47:04):
Oh, he'll do it.
He'll do it.
He's good at it too, man.
That man's gone.
Speaker 2 (47:09):
He's on a mission which is terrific, and we need
someone like that down here aswell, to be that sort of
outward-facing person.
But it's just brainbankorgau.
All our papers are publishedthere, and once we are on social
media, we'll all our handleswill be will be published on the
website as as well.
(47:30):
We are.
We have, um uh uh, launched aveterans brain bank, uh, so I
have been talking to PaulScanlon quite a bit.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Good for you.
Good for you man.
He's such a great guy.
Speaker 2 (47:43):
Love that guy and again a man on a mission, which
is absolutely fantastic.
We've got three brains in thereand we're starting to see some
interesting things again, whichI think will be important not
only to validate what's comingout of the US in an independent
(48:05):
set of people, but also to giveit that local context.
Speaker 1 (48:14):
These are Australian branch, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (48:18):
So that's something that I've been working on quite
a bit lately, and we're reallynow trying to push the basic
research Again.
As a pathologist, I think we'regoing to find treatments by
understanding the biology in thetissue, and so we've started
some quite sophisticatedmolecular analyses of CTE
(48:42):
lesions, trying to look forbiomarkers as well as
therapeutic targets, which I'mvery excited about, because that
is, you know, my core businessis getting brains making
diagnoses.
But if that can empower reallyhigh-end discovery science by
colleagues in Australia that youknow, we're going to get
(49:04):
answers quicker, and so that'swhat else we've been focusing on
.
Yeah, so a lot going on andstill a lot to be done.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
Well, I thank you so much for your time.
Well, I definitely want toreach out and get a piece of
that, a copy of that legislation.
We're writing similarlegislation here, but to look at
precedents is always going tohelp and we'd rather just adopt
and, you know, see what it's notlegislation.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
It is recommendations from a Senate inquiry.
So the Senate recommended allthis to the government.
The government has said they'lltake it on notice and think
about it a bit more.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Okay, so there we go pause.
But the ARL and NRL haveaccepted the causal link, so
that's big.
We'll try to get whateverinformation you can push to us
up there.
But look, I just want to thankyou for your time, sir.
I mean, this is another amazingconversation.
I cannot thank you enough forwhat you're doing in the field
of brain research, what you'redoing for our parents, you know,
(50:05):
and for the community at largedown under to help us address
this issue.
It's a problem, as you soeloquently put it in your TEDx
talk.
I can't talk enough about it,so keep driving on.
If there's anything we can dofor you, please let us know.
I want you to have a MerryChristmas, a very happily
(50:25):
extended Australian holidayseason, and I am working
diligently to get down there andwe'll go out there and have one
of Australia's best Victoriabitters beer when I end up in
Sydney.
I look forward to it.
Bruce, Thank you for having DrBuckley.
Thank you so much.
Uh, Folks, remember, you knowyou get a chance.
You get, you know.
Go to our website.
(50:45):
Free book, Okay, free bookendorsed by Chris Nowitzki, Dr
McKee, Dr Julie Stamm, Only bookfor parents on RHI.
Out there it's free.
Go get smart 88 pages.
You know a couple hundredresearch papers in the back.
I wrote it for you.
Go get it.
We'll send it down under DrBuckland.
Maybe you can endorse it andrecommend it for parents and
(51:06):
we'll send you a signed copy.
But another great episode ofBroken Brains.
Really catch you.
I'll catch you next week, Thankyou.
Hey folks, bruce Parkman here with Broken Brains,
sponsored by the Mack ParkmanFoundation, where we focus on
the issue of repetitive headtrauma and from our repetitive
head impacts and repetitiveblast exposure for our veterans
and what this type of trauma isdoing to the brains of so many
people in our population kids,adults, veterans and how we need
(00:35):
to make better choices and bebetter educated on the impacts
of sports and military trainingon these brains, the resulting
epidemic of mental illness andwhat can be done about it.
So every week we reach out toresearchers, scientists,
professional athletes, kids,parents to bring you the latest
information we can so you caneducate yourself, because this
is a relatively unknownphenomenon in our medical
(00:57):
psychological communities andyou need to be informed in order
to best protect those that youlove.
Today we've got another amazingguest, dr Michael Butlin, who
we know is the Anne McKee ofDown Under man.
This man is amazing.
I'm so excited about this, buthe is a senior neuropathologist
(01:18):
and head of the Department ofNeuropathology at the Royal
Prince Alfred Hospital and thehead of molecular neuropathology
program at the Braid and MindCenter at the University of
Sydney, and he's also theco-director of the Multiple
Sclerosis Research AustraliaBrain Bank.
He's one of the most pronouncedneuropathologists in the world.
If you've ever seen his TEDTalk that he's done on
(01:38):
repetitive head impact and itsrelationship to rugby, which is
basically original, please lookup that video.
You have to see that becauseonce I saw it, I reached out to
Dr Buckland in a heartbeatbecause nobody's talking about
this issue and espoused it sowell Dr Buckland, how you been
sir.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Very well, thank you, bruce.
Yeah, nice to see you again.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Good to see you again , sir.
So what's going on down under?
Uh, you know, I got my, my acdchat on.
I do play bagpipes in acdc band, so very excited, uh, you know,
to get, uh, to get catch backup with you and and see what's
going on in the world of rhi andrbe down under sir yeah, thank
you.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yes, well, I mean, for for us Christmas time is our
summer holidays, so, uh,generally the whole of Australia
shuts down for most of January.
Yes, sir, right at the beach.
So, uh, when I'm lookingforward to having some some time
off in the sun very shortly.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, that's right.
It's kind of reversed downthere with the summer months and
coming up.
I remember when I used to havemy company down in Canberra, I
always try to reach my employees, you know, after the Christmas
holidays, because in Americawe're idiots about work.
So we're back at work January3rd and it took me two years to
(03:07):
realize that that was just awaste of time, that nobody's
going to answer the phone in.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
January down in Australia.
Pretty much, yeah, it's prettymuch.
Get on it, man.
Sorry, I'll just get rid ofthat Look.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
I apologize for that.
Ah, don't worry about it, sir.
So what's been going on?
Have you been doing moreadditional research on the area?
I mean, we're seeing a lot ofissues coming out.
There's a lot of progress beingmade with the issue of kids in
contact sports and repetitiveimpacts, particularly in the AFL
(03:35):
down under.
So what are we doing?
I think things might be movingthe needle a little bit down
there.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Yes, look, I think it's been a remarkable few years
.
We've really seen.
Really, when we started offwith the Australian Sports Brain
Bank, we were told that, yeah,australian sports were different
.
This disease didn't exist downhere, it's an American
footballer's disease and youknow, within six years we've
(04:03):
seen that there's now been afederal government Senate
inquiry into concussions andrepeated head trauma in sports.
That came out with some reallystrong findings, which was great
, and probably the mostimportant one was that the
federal government Senateacknowledged the causal
(04:24):
relationship between exposure torepetitive head impacts and the
development of CTE.
Really.
So we've actually got agovernmental acknowledgement now
and in that inquest we did seeboth the AFL, australian Wolves
Football and the National RugbyLeague or the NRL, both
(04:44):
acknowledging that link whenpressed by the Senators.
So it's been quite remarkableto get that sort of on record
that now the major contactsports in Australia have
acknowledged a link betweenexposure to repeated head
impacts and CTE.
I mean that's.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
No well, I mean, the AFL have now, in fact, through
the Australian Institute ofSport, another governmental
agency has now indicated changedtheir concussion guidelines so
that there's a minimumthree-week stand down for a
concussion now, and I think whenwe started it was six days.
So we've certainly seen themmoving a lot, which is
(05:29):
absolutely fantastic.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Yeah, as you say down in Australia, bloody hell.
I mean that's amazing.
I mean to have.
So what has that done?
Now that they've done that,that you've recognized because
we still have a long way to goup here that link has been
recognized.
What does it has?
What has that done for thesport themselves?
Because just changing theconcussion protocols doesn't do
(05:53):
anything about changing ourexposure, which is, we know, is
the cause of CTE and everythingelse that we're talking about.
It all comes down to our HI.
So have they made any changes?
I mean what I'm following onTwitter and stuff I haven't
everybody's upset about thesered cards and you know 20 minute
stand downs and stuff like that, but that is an amazing
(06:15):
movement.
Were you part of the inquirythat got that going, sir?
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Oh, yes, I certainly gave evidence at the inquiry,
but I think, like most thingsyou know, they don't really care
about a doctor's opinion.
It was hearing from thefamilies of those that had died
from CTE.
I think that really, really puta rocket under the senators and
made them realize this was aproblem that affected everyday
(06:42):
people.
So, yes, yes, and look, there'sdefinitely more work to be done
.
As you said, cte is a problemof exposure to repeated head
impacts.
The codes, often in their publiccommunication, still conflate
the issue of concussion with theissue of CTE.
(07:05):
So they'll often say this iswe've got the best concussion
protocols in the world, and Idon't know if that's a
deliberate conflation or don'tquite get it.
I'm not sure.
But there's been other thingsas well, actually.
(07:26):
So, following on from thatSenate inquiry the Royal College
of Pathologists of Australasia,which is obviously the medical
college that I'm part of theyreleased a position statement on
CTE, also confirming the causalrelationship and calling for
specific CTE preventionprotocols.
(07:47):
In addition to concussionguidelines, there should be
specific protocols and policiesaround CTE prevention.
So that is something we'restill pushing now and, as you
know, the Concussion LegacyFoundation did release the first
(08:08):
ever CTE prevention protocol ayear or two ago and we certainly
contributed to that.
That was led by Dr ChrisNowinski from BU and CLF, bu and
CLF, and so we're certainlytrying to encourage sports to
(08:29):
look at that and to take up thatprotocol.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
And what are the primary points of that protocol
that you can share with us?
Is there anything aboutdelaying exposure, or is it, you
know, just being more educatedon the issue of RHI, and is RHI
even a part of those protocols?
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yes, very much focused on RHI and not
concussions.
It does include, you know,reference to age of first
exposure.
Exposure seems to be importantwith severity of symptoms later
in life.
So it does include delayingexposure to RHI through contact
(09:14):
sports until children are inhigh school, which is usually
about 13 or so.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yeah, 13, 14.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Yeah, yeah wow, and also just the cumulative
exposure.
So very similar to what you'veprobably got.
In the US, there'srecommendations around limiting
full contact training during theweek, particularly in a
professional game, and that'sactually recently.
(09:42):
The National Rugby LeaguePlayers Association have come
out and requested that and saidwhy aren't we doing this?
They're doing this in the US,why aren't we doing this here?
Which again, I think is areally positive move.
We're now starting to see theplayers say hang on a second, we
want to look after our brains,which I think is terrific.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
It absolutely is.
I mean, here in America, youknow, we know that the NFL has
no contact drills for the mostpart during the season and some
of our Ivy League colleges havedone that because of their focus
on, you know, finally sayinghey, academics is why we're here
, right, Not playing contactsports.
But when it gets to the highschools, we have nothing.
90 something percent, if notall high schools have contact
(10:30):
practice during the week andwhen we explain to them that the
NFL doesn't do it, they justdon't care.
They say, well, kids need tolearn how to tackle Tackle's
partly in the game.
I said, well then they shouldn'tbe playing the game.
I said, well then theyshouldn't be playing the game if
it's going to be damaging theonly organ that's going to get
them through life.
So where can this take us?
Like down in Australia?
(10:50):
That's an amazing developmentand for the national, the
leagues, they're understandingnow that you know their players
are their money or that is thesport.
We have to take care of them.
But are we seeing any impactfurther downstream, with the
high schools down under?
Because it sounds like we'vegot a lot to learn from the
Australians when it comes tocontact sports with this kind of
(11:12):
progress at these legislativelevels and professional levels.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, well, look, I don't want to paint too rosy a
picture.
I still think we've got a longway to go down here as well as
you do, but we've had a coupleof high schools private high
schools withdraw from contactsports competitions because of
(11:39):
this issue, but that's only beena handful.
It's definitely still a problemin high schools and, as you say
, they're the institutions youtrust your children's brain
development with, essentially,so to have them not really jump
(12:01):
on this does concern me andhopefully we'll see that change.
Um, uh, it is.
Yes, I mean it's probably likein in the us as well.
Some.
There are scholarships toprestigious high schools and
scholarships to universitiesbased on your sporting prowess.
(12:24):
So it is a pathway for peoplethat may be socioeconomically
disadvantaged.
There's a clear pathway forthem to get into the best school
and the best university byplaying footy.
So I can understand theattraction from individuals, but
(12:47):
certainly we need to do moreand I'm not sure what it's like
in the US, but it's quitecommonly.
The rate of suicide, deaths bysuicide in young people is quite
commonly talked about in thepress and by the government.
(13:10):
We're investing millions andmillions of dollars into the
issue, but I'm yet to see any ofthose conversations reference
RHI or concussions Reference RHIall concussions.
It's just not part of theequation, which seems to me a
(13:33):
huge oversight, since we'reessentially paying to inflict
these injuries on our childrenand then we're paying to clean
up afterwards when they havemental health issues or,
tragically, take their own life.
Health issues or or, or youknow, tragically take their own
life.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Uh, so yes, go yeah, no, I mean, we got the same.
You know I argue with peopleall the time oh, that's our,
that's my way out of the hood,is what how?
It's always put up here and myin my conversations with them I
always tell them.
I always tell people look, your, your child has a better chance
of becoming an accountant, adoctor or a lawyer than they do
(14:11):
playing professional sports.
Okay, yeah, they might not geta free ride to school, but there
are other ways to get freerides to school and if
endangering your child's brainhealth is going to be one of
them number one, you betterstart them really late because
in my professional opinion, drButlin, as a semi-pro rugby
player, you cannot stop naturaltalent.
If you're going to play in theAFL or NFL or the NRL, you're
destined in early life, when youjust got the gift.
(14:34):
And we tell people all the time.
Some of our NFL players didn'tstart playing football until
they were 16.
Like they were a junior lasttwo years of school and because
they were that good, they justran over everybody and just
walked right into college andwent on to play the NFL.
And the other side that we havehere is that our sports leagues
, especially in the NFL, we knowis just horrific when these
(14:58):
players leave the system and therates of financial destitution
and mental health are throughthe roof.
I personally know of a coach ofan NFL team.
He's an NFL player.
He's got four NFL players onhis staff, all of them including
himself all with severe mentalhealth issues, all from the
years of dedication.
(15:19):
See your point.
You know we're paying thesekids to go to school, but on the
other end, you know here we are.
You know we're paying thesekids to go to school, but on the
other end, you know here we are.
So it sounds like you downunder have the same problems
with suicide issues that we havein America.
It's a huge problem up here.
I mean the level of young peoplethat just don't want to be here
anymore or that end up in jailare not there, and I think it
(15:42):
all has to do with prioritizingbrain health.
Give me your opinion on this.
Like when I go to the doctor,they check my heart, they listen
to my lungs, they smack me inthe knee, but nobody has ever
asked me.
You know how's your brain doing.
You know what's going on upthere.
Have you taken any knocks?
You know?
I do think that if we couldprioritize brain health, we
(16:04):
could get a better sense ofbrain awareness and brain.
You know, I do think that if wecould prioritize brain health,
we could get a better sense ofbrain awareness and brain.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
You know, just you know, you know, understanding
how important this organ is tous, where we might take a second
look at letting Junior playfooty at, you know, at 10 years
old yes, yes, I um, I oftenwonder what, uh, like, uh, when
our grandkids are adults, ifthey look back and think, oh my
god, what the hell were thosepeople in you know 2024 doing to
(16:34):
their kids.
You know, and I probably willtake that generational change to
to really start to appreciatehow important our brain health
is and we face the same problem.
It is because I do a lot of notonly with the Sports Brain Bank
, I also do a lot of work forthe New South Wales State,
(16:58):
coroner, which is New SouthWales is the state that I'm in
in Sydney and it's the largestpot bite population state in
Australia and we get a lot ofbrains through there as well.
But what we never get is everis a history of contact sports.
So it might be a history ofdrug and alcohol use or it might
(17:19):
be a history of overseas travelor vaccination history, all
that sort of social historywhich is routinely collected in
a medical examination, but nevercontact sports history.
And in fact that was one of therecommendations from the Royal
College of Pathologists that ahistory of contact sports and
(17:40):
other TBI exposure be part ofevery medical history taking.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
So I agree completely , yes, sir, and I think it
should be part of everybodythat's going into incarceration
as well.
I think that if we addressbrain health as a societal issue
, like we prioritize this, likewe're prioritizing suicide or
drug abuse or a teenagepregnancy, prioritizing suicide
(18:09):
or drug abuse or a teenagepregnancy, we could change the,
the, the, the.
There's so many social illshere that have now now, are now
to be understood, or could havebeen, you know, you know, caused
by repetitive head impact.
The only reason I'm talking toyou, doctor, is that when my son
took his life, um, and I waited, you know three months, the
coroner finally gave us theautopsy.
He's like, mr Parkman, I'msorry your son took his life.
(18:30):
I'm like, wow.
I said why.
I want you to explain why myson, who was loved, never abused
, you know, believed in our Lord, went to a private school, had
a, you know, a used car, youknow skied, went on vacations,
was loved more than anythingthat I could do.
I loved that boy Everything.
His family loved him, everybodyloved him.
He's just, you know, a thousandpeople showed up to his service
(18:51):
.
I said why is he not here?
You know what he told me.
He said did your son playcontact sports.
That one sentence changed mylife and I said what do you?
I said, of course he's anAmerican kid.
He played contact sports.
(19:11):
He played rugby, played hockey,played soccer, he played
football, he played wrestling,he played anything he wanted to
play.
What's that got to do with thefact that he's dead?
That is what got me talking toyou and Dr McKee, because he
said I.
He said have you heard aboutCTE?
I'm like the football disease.
He goes yeah, he says I triedto do a scan but I don't have
the equipment, and that alonesent me on this journey.
But to your point, dr Buckle,the majority of our coroners are
(19:34):
like our psychologists, likeour nurses and, like our doctors
, are completely untrained onthe issue or the correlation
between RHI and contact sports,damaged brains and mental
illness, and so when suicideshappen, this is not even on the
radar.
Now, I'm not asking to put anumber out there at all, but I
(19:54):
do think there might be astatistically significant amount
of these suicides that have a.
You know, given the number ofpeople that play contact sports,
I don't think you're, I thinkyou're going to find a
significant amount of thesebrains that at least have had
some exposure.
Now the amount of exposure thatcould have, you know, like,
according to the TES protocols,whatever you know caused them to
(20:15):
be damaged.
But I mean, I think that Ithink that you're onto something
.
What would be the path thatwe're trying to figure this out
in America?
What would be the path thatwe're trying to figure this out
in America?
What would be the path?
Think of all the families thatcould have some closure.
Like, I had closure.
I could understand.
You know, I didn't want tounderstand why my son might not
(20:36):
be here.
Okay, brain damage Now I knowwhat.
He wasn't crazy, he wasn'tcaught up in drugs or porn or
Satan or whatever.
My son had a brain injury.
Okay, that gives us someclosure.
These families deserve thatkind of closure.
What do you think it would taketo make that kind of awareness?
You know, like part of cornertraining, or you know certified
medical education credits oranything like that.
(20:57):
How do we get there?
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah, look, I'm with you all the way.
I wonder how big the problem is.
I don't know.
I don't have any statistics,but it does worry me, like it
worries you.
How many of these youngsuicides are due to exposure to
this RHI and mild traumaticbrain injury?
We have no idea.
(21:21):
We have no idea.
I've been working because I havethe relationship with the New
South Wales state coroner.
I have been working with thecoroners across the country to
try and educate them at theirannual meeting.
(21:41):
I've presented several times onthe issue and I actually feel
like things are starting tochange a little bit, in that
when we first started the BrainBank down here very much, I was
often on the phone callingfamilies asking them if they
(22:03):
would consider donating theirloved ones' brains.
But the last few years it'schanged, whereas now we're
getting calls and it's eitherfrom families or, in a not
insignificant number of times,it's from a coroner or a
coronial liaison officer fromthe coroner's office.
Um, this case uh, um, you know,may be of interest to you or it
(22:29):
may, uh, the family have hadasked.
So we're happy to help with, um, you know, retrieving this
brain donation.
So that has changed a littlebit.
Um, it's we really.
I don't know what it's like inthe us, but in australia, um
again, all that coroner'slegislation is state by state.
(22:52):
We don't have some overarchingnational you only.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
You only have seven states down there.
We got 50 and they all don'tget along.
So, yeah, I got it.
I like that.
No, but good point, sir, goodpoint.
Yeah, we got 50 and they alldon't get along.
So, yeah, I got it.
No, but good point, sir, goodpoint.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Yeah, but almost all of the state-based legislation
has this clause in the coroner'spowers saying that the coroner
must determine the cause andmanner of death in the least
invasive way possible.
So many coroners feel that thatrestricts their ability to go
(23:34):
investigating, say, thepossibility of brain disease in
young suicide people, becausethey decide that the cause and
manner of death is alreadyevident.
You know this personunfortunately hung himself.
He had a history of mentalhealth problems.
It was a suicide note.
There's no suspiciouscircumstances.
(23:55):
I don't need to look at thisperson's brain, which is, I mean
, I think it's a good there'sobviously that was put in for
good intentions, but I think ithas unintended negative
consequences.
Now it's like the coronerscan't necessarily follow their
gut instinct and go and look atthat person's brain because the
(24:17):
legislation says you need to doit in the least invasive way
possible.
So that's something again,hopefully that may change in the
least invasive way possible.
So that's something that worksagain.
Hopefully that may change inthe future.
But it's an issue.
I'm sorry now I've forgottenyour question completely.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
No, no, that was it.
It's like you know, how do weget these coroners to understand
that there could be an issue?
And if they're collecting thedata that would indicate the
possibility of an RHI-related,you know mental illness or
suicide is high, then they havethe duty to investigate for the
family.
But you know, we also have toeducate the families on this,
(24:57):
because you know, most families,if their loved ones you know
their kids or their spouse,takes their life, they have
absolutely no clue that theirhistory of RHI, you know, no
matter how, it's induced throughmilitary service, domestic
abuse or whatever, or contactsports, especially contact
sports, because we're groomed tothink that these sports are
(25:19):
innocuous, right, they're safe.
You know, let's just go play.
Right, let's go, come on, comeon, six year old has a helmet,
let's go out there.
You know, we're groomed, sothen we don't question, we don't
even think that they could berelated where I think, if we
raise the possibility of doubtin the public's mind that hey,
there is a link here.
And I and you know when, when I, when my son passed, I was
(25:41):
going to do anything to get tothe bottom of this, I didn't
care, I didn't care if I went tojail man.
I found out that he was gettingdrugs to deal with his
schizophrenia from the footballteam.
They broke into our house.
I mean we had massive criminalcase going on.
But you know, when a parent'sin that position man, they're
(26:02):
going to do anything they can toget to the bottom.
But I think that's going to bea great and that's something
that we could definitely worktogether on.
Let's talk a little bit aboutthe old in vivo diagnosis.
There's this holy grail thateverybody's looking for the
biomarkers and the blood plasmathings and all that.
And we have this set ofprotocols in the US called
(26:23):
traumatic encephalopathysyndrome protocols.
Right, these were approved byNINDS not yet validated, but
approved as a screening tool.
Right, to either provide adiagnosis that could be then
substantiated with, you know,brain scans, and then you know
some other.
You know tests whatever.
We got blood tests, right.
(26:44):
But where are we at with that?
Because we don't have the meansyet.
I mean, we have the ability tounderstand in the research
community and in poorly educatedpeople like myself that this is
an issue, but at the same timewe have a diagnosis tool that
could be easily implemented.
Any parent could ask those fourquestions.
(27:05):
Right.
Where do you think we couldtake that in the community
Australia, uk, america, contactSportsville, right.
What could we do with that?
Because I do believe that thatcould be one of the answers in
terms of, you know, evaluatingand diagnosing mental illness
while the child is still alive.
(27:25):
So we can get ahead of this byassessing the history of RHI.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Oh gee, that's a good question.
So we know with the originalTES criteria that they
definitely cast a very wide netand even though lots of people
satisfied those criteria whenthey went to validate the first
(27:52):
bunch of them, it was only onein five ended up having a
pathological diagnosis of CTE.
And, as you said, we're stillwaiting for how the revised
criteria are going to perform.
I think it's hard when you speakto a pathologist, I think in
(28:15):
that, while definitely I meanCTE, the clinical diagnostics
are not reliable yet at all.
So aware that in fact, most ofthe degenerative brain diseases,
(28:39):
the clinicians are notparticularly good at diagnosing
it during life, and it may wellbe that they diagnose the one
pathology, but when you look atthe brain, there's two other
pathologies going on as well.
So it's not something that'snecessarily restricted to CTE or
TES, but it's certainlyprobably because it's only 15 or
(29:03):
20 years since we've startedlooking at CTE and TES, so there
hasn't been that large body ordepth of research over many
decades, which is probably whywe're a little bit behind
compared to other degenerativebrain diseases, and that's yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
I mean all good points, but my point is, doctor,
when we have a kid that hasmental illness, we can err on
the side of caution because thetreatment, even if you
misdiagnose TES, the worst thingyou're going to do is not play
contact sports and beat yourhead up.
Right, we're going to say don'tplay contact sports and then
over time it becomes all right,you go back and I'm sorry, I
wrecked your foodie career atthe age of eight Go play.
(29:44):
You know whatever I mean.
So that's that was our point isthat, look, you know, we might
not be able to diagnose it, butat least we're evaluating a
potential cause and we'reeliminating one of the key
factors that could becontributing to the problem.
And on the side of caution,we're talking about kids with
mental illness, if you know, weat least err on the side of
(30:07):
caution and the remedy is notpills or chemotherapy or
medication.
It's don't play contact sports.
I'm sorry you're going to playyour medication.
It's don't play contact sports.
I'm sorry.
You're going to play baseball.
You're going to you, just don'tplay rugby.
You play touch rugby or soccer.
You know, even soccer, withouthitting the ball, can be a safe
sport.
I mean, that's where we're kindof I'm going with that and is
(30:28):
like you know, it's the samething with repetitive blast
exposure in our veterans, oursuicide rates.
Here we've lost 20 times theamount of kids that died in
combat to mental illness andsuicide.
We have no idea where braindamage is involved in that
number of suicides and wehaven't screened for that
(30:49):
because we just don't do it yet.
It's just becoming a.
You know, paul Scanlon downunder, I don't know if you know
Paul, paul and I go way back,good man, he's got he's on a one
man crusade down there rightnow on this whole RBE thing.
And, and I just think, when itcomes to mental illness, you
know, you know we're we'retalking about modalities that
are not covered by insurance,treatment that could help out.
(31:12):
So, yeah, yeah I, I think thatyou know, you know when, if we
don't have an in vivo diagnosis,doing something, whether than
just, you know, not, educatingour you know, our scientific, uh
or our medical community wouldbe better than nothing.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Look, I take, I take your point.
I think you're absolutely right.
Uh, in a way, if you can takeTES or whatever away from CTE,
because it actually doesn'treally matter what the
underlying pathology is, itdoesn't, sir, if they're
symptomatic and you think it'sdue to taking too many knocks to
(31:50):
the head.
So I agree, that's a verypragmatic approach.
Is that you should be thinking,hang on, yeah, they do satisfy
these criteria.
Let's pull them out of footyfor a year or two and see how
they go.
People doubles their risk ofsuicide.
There's 40% increase in novelneuropsychiatric disorders in
(32:19):
young people after a singleconcussion.
So there's fairly good evidenceout there that it's not just a
CTE thing, it's a brain traumathing.
So, yeah, I agree with youentirely.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
In conversations.
I was talking to Bob Stern andhe, at the end of his career, he
said Bruce, I don't think TESis related to CTE.
Tes in and of itself is anissue.
It's a diagnosis, it is acondition.
Now, over time, those samefactors that led to a TES
diagnosis would absolutely leadto a CTE diagnosis post mortem.
(32:54):
But you know it was.
He was becoming, you know,aligned with you on that point.
That TES, or, you know, whateverwe're going to call it, is not
CTE.
It is a separate diagnosticcondition as a result of RHI
that then can be treated If wecan find it in life.
I mean, I mean, dr Buckland,what we're coming across now to
(33:14):
treat the brain in America,since my son is left between
brain supplementation programsand all these technical
modalities like TMS andphotobiomodulation and
hyperbaric oxygen therapy, vagusnerve stimulation, then the
whole psychedelics side of thisis all providing enormous relief
(33:35):
and improvement in all keycognitive, behavioral,
psychological areas for veteransand for professional athletes
that are trying these, you know,but here in the US none of them
are covered by insurance.
I mean, that's our big, that'sone of our challenges right now.
We don't have billing codes.
Where do you think the frontieris in this space around the
(33:55):
world.
You know where we can.
You know, once we have a brainthat's been damaged by RHR, what
are you seeing as some of thenovel approaches to treating
that brain, besides the approachof drugs and therapy, which is
not helping our veteranpopulation at all?
That's all we have.
For 20 years later, we're stilldoing drugs and therapy and
guess what?
We still got a suicide level.
(34:18):
That's unacceptable.
It's not even close to dropping.
So we got to do somethingdifferent.
We have to think outside thebox.
What are you seeing in terms ofthe research on the treatment
side with brain health thatmight be coming about that can
help those that are affected?
Speaker 2 (34:35):
that might be coming about that can help those that
are affected.
Look, I guess as a pathologist,I'm not an expert in that area.
Okay, fair enough.
I would say that we don't yetunderstand all.
The CGE is easy to see, butthere's other pathologies in the
brain which we are not good atseeing even under the microscope
(34:58):
, and we need to understand howto quantify changes in white
matter integrity and bloodvessels.
And I think there's a lot more.
That's probably right there infront of our eyes, but because
we don't have the knowledge baseto see it, we're not seeing it,
we're not counting it.
(35:18):
I agree, though, that there doesseem to be an explosion in all
these treatments.
I don't know how many of themhave put through clinical trials
and shown positive results.
Theoretically, I love the ideaof hyperbaric oxygen.
I don't know if it works or not, but intuitively I'm drawn to
(35:41):
that.
I'm drawn to that TMS as atherapy.
I think that's definitely gotenough buzz about it that it
needs to be tested in properclinical trials, and I'm sure,
with psychedelics and otherdrugs, there's probably going to
(36:02):
be some good treatments inthere as well.
What I also wonder about isthat it might be.
You know, there's CTE.
There might be another form ofmild TBI that's mostly white
matter injury.
There might be another formwhich is a mixture of white
matter and blood vessel injury,and maybe, in fact, in 20 years'
(36:25):
time, we'll be talking aboutthe eight different subtypes and
maybe each one will have adifferent treatment.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
And each one will have been caused by repetitive
head impact in contact sports,which is what the audience needs
to understand.
It's.
You know this doesn't happen.
This doesn't have to happen,you know so.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
But it might be that just because something doesn't
now doesn't work in a clinicaltrial, it's because we're
lumping people with actually alleight different variants into
one bucket and testing them andit might be that one of those
eight you know variants of tesresponds really well to
psychedelic therapy.
But you won't see that signalbecause it's diluted out with
(37:08):
all the other um one.
So often when people ask melook if something's working for
you, that's, that's the mostimportant thing.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
Uh yeah that's a key point.
That's a key point.
That um did you uh.
So how big is your brain bankright now?
How many uh brain?
I know you're one of the newest, newer brain banks for sports,
right.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Yes, I think we launched in 2018.
Okay, I didn't have any greyhair in 2018.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
They're wearing you out, man.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
Great journey.
We're up to 130 brains donatednow, which you know Australia
has a population of 25 million,so it's probably the size of one
of your states.
So yeah, in that populationbase I think we've done very
well, absolutely.
(38:05):
We're just crunching the numberon our first, all the numbers,
on our first 99 brains, and Ithink we, for the first time,
being able to independentlyreplicate some of the findings
from the BU team in terms of,but in an Australian context.
So with Australian contactsports, there does seem to be a
(38:30):
relationship between astatistically significant
relationship between number ofyears played and CTE risk.
So validating those sort ofobservations in a local context,
I think it's really importantand does give more power to the
arguments that hang on.
This is something that we needto be concerned about.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Yeah, I don't know if you know that study that we
funded we helped fund with AnneMcKee that study that was
released last August where we wegot Dr McKee's team to look at
the under 30 brains and theyevaluated them means of death,
and that study I'm sure youmight have seen it, but 40% of
(39:20):
those 162 brains all under 30,had CTE.
100% of those brains hadstructural integrity damage to
them, 100% of those brains wereassociated with severe cognitive
, psychological and behavioraldisorders and 80% of them died
by suicide or overdose.
So I mean I would love to seeif that type of study could be
(39:41):
replicated down under when you,even at whatever level of brains
that you have, because I thinkthat will only lend credence,
because the only commondenominator across those brains
was a history of contact sports,rhi, and I think that can, you
know, help.
I mean we're learning from younow.
I mean, on the veteran side, Iheard that we're way ahead of
(40:03):
the Australians on, you know,veterans legislation stuff.
But with some of these momentsthat you've mentioned, we
desperately need to get there inAmerica and I mean it's just
amazing to hear some of theprogress and I don't think the
lawsuits have hurt either.
There's some I mean massivelitigation going on in the UK
(40:24):
and Europe right now, and Ithink there might be some going
on in Australia, if I'm notmistaken.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
It's looming.
Yes, I think that there is abig class action which has been
filed but is yet to start orcommence.
However, that works in thelegal setting.
But, yeah, look, we're seeingthat very disturbing association
, I think, of our brains withCTE.
It's about 48% died fromsuicide and compared to, you
(40:55):
know, 20% or less than peoplethat didn't have CTE.
And, uh, if you look at justthe young people, that
percentage goes, goes evenhigher, over 50%, which is
definitely concerning.
Uh, it's, it's, um.
We have a yeah, I am aware ofthat paper and I got to say that
(41:16):
um, and usually, if I thinkI've had a bright idea, I then
find out Anne McKee thought ofit two years earlier, which is
she's really ahead of the game.
Speaker 1 (41:26):
We pushed her pretty hard on that one and that
started with my son's brain whenI asked her, because I ended up
writing the book and I wantedto know what was in there, and
so we put together you know wewere part of the funding but
yeah, she did an amazing job andto see where that could go, if
(41:47):
that, if that, if that, you know, study helps you in any way.
You know we can.
There's more to be done, right,but the the, the bottom line is
you know RHI, you know it hasto.
Rhi and brain health have tobecome, you know a more I don't
know what you say just a moreaccepted part of how we talk
about contact sports, becauseyou know it's producing a lot of
(42:11):
carnage, as we both well know.
You're on the other side of it.
So what?
Yeah, go ahead, what?
So what?
Speaker 2 (42:19):
what?
Yeah, good, yeah, I would loveyou know, ideally, and I'd
probably be shot down in flamesfor this, but you know, we are a
country of 25 million, whyaren't we looking at every
single brain of people thatcommit suicide?
If it's such a nationalemergency, why aren't we looking
(42:40):
at the brains of the peoplethat commit suicide?
I mean, I would love to be ableto say we will take anyone's
brain that commits suicide forthe next three years and we
might get a lot of brains.
But that's okay.
I think it needs to be done.
It needs to be looked at insuch a way.
(43:01):
I mean, you're never going toget it completely unbiased, but
even if it's like we don't careif you've played sports or if
you don't know if that personplayed sports, let's just look
at them.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Let's just look at them?
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Yeah, because we're not looking.
It's the most complex organ wehave and all these people have
mental health issues.
No one cares about looking attheir brains.
It just to me seems outrageous,and I think our understanding
of brain disease it's probablytoday is like our understanding
(43:35):
of cancer in like 1985.
Yeah, we're that far behind andwe've seen all the explosions
in cancer treatments, many ofwhich are based on understanding
what's going on in the tissue,and that's going to be even more
so, even more relevant, when itcomes to brain health and
(43:56):
problems with thinking and moodand behavior.
So there's a lot to be done,yeah, but I'm with you 100%
there.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
No, I mean, but with cancer we don't have, you know,
an entire subset of ourpopulation, professional sports,
all this money pushing backagainst treatments that can
improve, because we'll have tounderstand and recognize that
we've had an impact on brainsand now we just have to make it
right.
I mean, nobody needs to pointfingers, nobody needs to write
big checks.
All we got to do as a societyis say, look, now we have this
(44:28):
knowledge, now we understandthis.
I mean, honestly, dr Buckland,in that study, with 40% of those
kids having CTE.
One of the reasons that we'renow finding CTE, in my
perspective, in people in their20s and 30s is because back in
the 70s and 80s and 60s, kidsdidn't put helmets on at six
(44:48):
years old, right?
And so you know, we have muchlonger exposure rates as
children.
That, I think, is driving theseyou know, skyrocketing rates,
you know.
You know skyrocketing 40% ofthese brains having CTE in their
20s and under 30, all of themunder 30, 40% of them.
And so that comes to how weplay contact sports and how do
(45:10):
we make better decisions.
And that's why, man, I keepgoing back to your, your TED
talk, man, that was.
You put that out so eloquentlyand and it was just, it was and
it was just so heartwarming tohear somebody say this with your
background that we have toaddress RHI If we're going to
(45:31):
continue as a society and say welove our kids and we love our
sports, without addressing this,we're going to continue to have
, you know, massive amounts oftragedy, massive amounts of
heartbreak and so on and soforth.
So so, what are you working onnow?
How do people find you?
I mean, I definitely you knowwe're going to hang the, the,
(45:53):
the, the link to your Ted talkon the on the podcast and we we
go.
But what are you working on now, dr Buckland, and how can
people follow your work?
Are you on, you know, socialmedia or you know?
How do people follow what youwork?
Because your opinion, yourperspective here in America is
so important to the populationthat we're trying to address
(46:15):
medical researchers and parents.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
Oh, thank you.
Look at the moment.
I've actually taken a breakfrom social media.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
I don't blame you.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
I'm feeling better for it as well.
So we're yet to have asignificant social media
presence, but our website's verysimple.
It's just wwwbrainbankorgau.
Uh, so it's just brainbankorgau.
Um, uh, if once we do start toget more of a fraud facing role
(46:54):
I mean, I've been trying to tellChris Nominski he's got to come
down here and start, you know,cracking heads in Australian
media to uh media to get theexposure.
Speaker 1 (47:04):
Oh, he'll do it.
He'll do it.
He's good at it too, man.
That man's gone.
Speaker 2 (47:09):
He's on a mission which is terrific, and we need
someone like that down here aswell, to be that sort of
outward-facing person.
But it's just brainbankorgau.
All our papers are publishedthere, and once we are on social
media, we'll all our handleswill be will be published on the
website as as well.
(47:30):
We are.
We have, um uh uh, launched aveterans brain bank, uh, so I
have been talking to PaulScanlon quite a bit.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Good for you.
Good for you man.
He's such a great guy.
Speaker 2 (47:43):
Love that guy and again a man on a mission, which
is absolutely fantastic.
We've got three brains in thereand we're starting to see some
interesting things again, whichI think will be important not
only to validate what's comingout of the US in an independent
(48:05):
set of people, but also to giveit that local context.
Speaker 1 (48:14):
These are Australian branch, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (48:18):
So that's something that I've been working on quite
a bit lately, and we're reallynow trying to push the basic
research Again.
As a pathologist, I think we'regoing to find treatments by
understanding the biology in thetissue, and so we've started
some quite sophisticatedmolecular analyses of CTE
(48:42):
lesions, trying to look forbiomarkers as well as
therapeutic targets, which I'mvery excited about, because that
is, you know, my core businessis getting brains making
diagnoses.
But if that can empower reallyhigh-end discovery science by
colleagues in Australia that youknow, we're going to get
(49:04):
answers quicker, and so that'swhat else we've been focusing on
.
Yeah, so a lot going on andstill a lot to be done.
Speaker 1 (49:17):
Well, I thank you so much for your time.
Well, I definitely want toreach out and get a piece of
that, a copy of that legislation.
We're writing similarlegislation here, but to look at
precedents is always going tohelp and we'd rather just adopt
and, you know, see what it's notlegislation.
Speaker 2 (49:32):
It is recommendations from a Senate inquiry.
So the Senate recommended allthis to the government.
The government has said they'lltake it on notice and think
about it a bit more.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Okay, so there we go pause.
But the ARL and NRL haveaccepted the causal link, so
that's big.
We'll try to get whateverinformation you can push to us
up there.
But look, I just want to thankyou for your time, sir.
I mean, this is another amazingconversation.
I cannot thank you enough forwhat you're doing in the field
of brain research, what you'redoing for our parents, you know,
(50:05):
and for the community at largedown under to help us address
this issue.
It's a problem, as you soeloquently put it in your TEDx
talk.
I can't talk enough about it,so keep driving on.
If there's anything we can dofor you, please let us know.
I want you to have a MerryChristmas, a very happily
(50:25):
extended Australian holidayseason, and I am working
diligently to get down there andwe'll go out there and have one
of Australia's best Victoriabitters beer when I end up in
Sydney.
I look forward to it.
Bruce, Thank you for having DrBuckley.
Thank you so much.
Uh, Folks, remember, you knowyou get a chance.
You get, you know.
Go to our website.
(50:45):
Free book, Okay, free bookendorsed by Chris Nowitzki, Dr
McKee, Dr Julie Stamm, Only bookfor parents on RHI.
Out there it's free.
Go get smart 88 pages.
You know a couple hundredresearch papers in the back.
I wrote it for you.
Go get it.
We'll send it down under DrBuckland.
Maybe you can endorse it andrecommend it for parents and
(51:06):
we'll send you a signed copy.
But another great episode ofBroken Brains.
Really catch you.
I'll catch you next week, Thankyou.
Popular Podcasts
Are You A Charlotte?
In 1997, actress Kristin Davis’ life was forever changed when she took on the role of Charlotte York in Sex and the City. As we watched Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte navigate relationships in NYC, the show helped push once unacceptable conversation topics out of the shadows and altered the narrative around women and sex. We all saw ourselves in them as they searched for fulfillment in life, sex and friendships. Now, Kristin Davis wants to connect with you, the fans, and share untold stories and all the behind the scenes. Together, with Kristin and special guests, what will begin with Sex and the City will evolve into talks about themes that are still so relevant today. "Are you a Charlotte?" is much more than just rewatching this beloved show, it brings the past and the present together as we talk with heart, humor and of course some optimism.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com