ArticleBritish journal of sports medicine2022
Healthspan and chronic disease burden among young adult and middle-aged male former American-style professional football players.
Article in British journal of sports medicine, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 16 citations in OpenAlex.
- Demographic patterns in quantitative sensory testing and clinical pain among former professional American-style football players.Pain reports · 2026Article
- Association of arthritis and total joint arthroplasty with self-reported function in former professional American-style football players.PM & R : the journal of injury, function, and rehabilitation · 2026Article
- Factors Associated With Functional Outcomes in Former Professional American-Style Football Players With Symptomatic Knee and Hip Osteoarthritis.Orthopaedic journal of sports medicine · 2026Article
- American-Style Football Players: A Novel Window Into the Brain-Heart Connection.JACC. Case reports · 2026Article
- The paradox of sport: adolescent athletes are highly sedentary across competition, practice, and rest days.BMC sports science, medicine & rehabilitation · 2026Article
- Characterizing white matter and vascular pathologies in brain donors exposed to repetitive head impacts.Acta neuropathologica · 2025Article
- Contributors to caregiver burden, depression, and anxiety in the partners of professional American-style football players: a cross-sectional study.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Health and Lifestyle Factors and Dementia Risk Among Former Professional Soccer Players.JAMA network open · 2024Article
- Career duration and later-life health conditions among former professional American-style football players.Occupational and environmental medicine · 2024Article
- Long-term risk of cardiovascular disease after traumatic brain injury: screening and prevention.The Lancet. Neurology · 2023Review
- Dietary Approaches from Moms, Farms, and Nature to Overcome Chronic Diseases and the Pharmacracy.Nutrients · 2023Article
- Tau Positron Emission Tomography and Neurocognitive Function Among Former Professional American-Style Football Players.Journal of neurotrauma · 2023Article
- Long-term function, body composition and cardiometabolic health in midlife former athletes: a scoping review.BMJ open sport & exercise medicine · 2023Article
- Distinct Five-Year Latent Class Trajectories and Predictors of Functional Cognitive Independence Following Traumatic Brain Injury: A TBI Model Systems Study.Neurotrauma reportsArticle
- Ten-Year Latent Trajectories of Global Function and Their Associations with Social Relationship Factors: A Traumatic Brain Injury Model Systems Study.Neurotrauma reportsArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
16 authors at 7 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveTo examine the relationships between age, healthspan and chronic illness among former professional American-style football (ASF) players.
methodsWe compared age-specific race-standardised and body mass index-standardised prevalence ratios of arthritis, dementia/Alzheimer's disease, hypertension and diabetes among early adult and middle-aged (range 25-59 years) male former professional ASF players (n=2864) with a comparator cohort from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and National Health Interview Survey, two representative samples of the US general population. Age was stratified into 25-29, 30-39, 40-49 and 50-59 years.
resultsArthritis and dementia/Alzheimer's disease were more prevalent among ASF players across all study age ranges (all p<0.001). In contrast, hypertension and diabetes were more prevalent among ASF players in the youngest age stratum only (p<0.001 and p<0.01, respectively). ASF players were less likely to demonstrate intact healthspan (ie, absence of chronic disease) than the general population across all age ranges.
conclusionThese data suggest the emergence of a maladaptive early ageing phenotype among former professional ASF players characterised by premature burden of chronic disease and reduced healthspan. Additional study is needed to investigate these findings and their impact on morbidity and mortality in former ASF players and other athlete groups.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.