Soccer heading may cause even more brain damage than doctors thought

CHICAGO — It may cost you the game but do yourself a favor and don’t hit that soccer ball with your head. That’s the latest warning from doctors who recently found that heading, a common technique soccer players use to pass and control the direction of the ball with their heads, causes more brain damage than previously believed.

A new study presented at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America found that even without concussions, repeated head impacts in sports can damage the frontal lobe of the brain and cause long-term cognitive issues. 

“The study identifies structural brain abnormalities from repeated head impacts among healthy athletes,” says Dr. Michael Lipton, a professor of radiology at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, in a media release. “The abnormalities occur in the locations most characteristic of CTE, are associated with worse ability to learn a cognitive task and could affect function in the future.”

Previous work has shown a link between head impacts and neurodegenerative diseases, such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Additionally, researchers have also seen injuries in the white matter of the brain among soccer players.

The latest study uses a new approach to studying athletes’ brains: diffusion MRI. This type of brain imaging can examine microstructures close to the brain’s surface. 

Researchers compared the brain scans of 352 male and female amateur soccer players between the ages of 18 and 53 to the brain MRIs of 77 non-contact athletes, such as runners. Soccer players, who often hit the ball with their heads, showed abnormal changes to the white matter in the brain next to sulci. Sulci are deep grooves in the brain’s surface. These physical brain changes are also seen in people who experienced severe traumatic brain injuries.

Brain structural changes were most clear in the frontal lobe, which is involved in critical thinking, planning, learning, and attention. Damage to this region was linked to issues with verbal learning.

“Our analysis showed that the white matter abnormalities represent a mechanism by which heading leads to worse cognitive performance,” explains Lipton.

Most of the people in the study never suffered a concussion or were previously diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury. Even though repeated blows to the head don’t always result in concussions, the findings reveal they still can cause injury to the brain.

While the study looked at heading from soccer players, the authors note the results can also apply to head injuries from other contact sports, such as football.

“Characterizing the potential risks of repetitive head impacts can facilitate safer sport engagement to maximize benefits while minimizing potential harms,” Lipton concludes. “The next phase of the study is ongoing and examines the brain mechanisms underlying the MRI effects and potential protective factors.”