Overview

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is a neurodegenerative disease described in boxing, but also in contact sports such as American football.

Soccer, due to repeated headers, could also be associated, albeit to a lesser degree, with the development of this type of pathology.

Indeed, it has been shown that playing soccer can be accompanied by cognitive impairments, and neurodegenerative brain abnormalities have been described in neuropathology studies of former professional soccer players. Subradiological brain abnormalities have been found in multimodal MRI in various sports. Similarly, a decrease in cognitive performance has been described.

The discovery of this type of anomaly in a population of professional footballers nearing the end of their careers could lead to:

• The implementation of appropriate monitoring for professional footballers through early detection of lesions via MRI and cognitive disorders
• The implementation of preventative measures for professional footballers, but also for amateur footballers from a very young age.

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Male subject
• Aged 32 to 60 years inclusive
• Professional footballer nearing the end of their career or recently retired, or subject who has never regularly participated in sports that expose them to head trauma (particularly rugby, basketball, handball, American football, hockey, combat sports, etc.)

Exclusion Criteria:

\- Subject who expressed their opposition to participating in the study