According to TSN's Rick Westhead, the NHL is attempting to force Boston University to turn over all its research into CTE, and that's causing great concern among the university's researchers:
Lawyers for the plaintiffs involved in the NHL lawsuit allege the league wants to obtain information from Boston University to cast doubt on its research. The school has announced a diagnosis of CTE in three former NHL players – Reggie Fleming, Rick Martin and Derek Boogaard – and those diagnoses may help to make the case that head injuries suffered in the NHL have caused lethal damage, the lawyers say.
The NHL’s medical expert, Dr. Rudy Castellani – who wrote in a March 2016 opinion piece published in the International Journal of Clinical Neurosciences and Mental Health that CTE was more “of a hypothetical construct or concept than an actual disease” – has asked for copies of all of Boston University’s pathology photographs, brain slides and clinical data so he can verify the accuracy of the reports.
Dr. Robert Stern, a professor of neurology at Boston University, said he’s concerned about Dr. Castellani’s request because of the school’s promise of privacy to its study subjects and because meeting the NHL’s demands would distract researchers from a seven-year study of CTE that was funded in December 2015 and involves 240 former NFL and college football players.
“The [NHL] subpoena’s astonishing scope and breadth of coverage will, if enforced, impose an incredible burden and disrupt the CTE Center’s operations,” Dr. Stern wrote in an affidavit. “This request will harm ALL ongoing CTE-related research, both at BU and at institutions that collaborate with BU and/or rely on BU findings as part of follow-on work.”
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