Browsing by Author "Rettke, Devin J."

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    Association Between Head Impact Exposure, Psychological Needs, and Indicators of Mental Health Among U.S. High School Tackle Football Players
    (Elsevier, 2023) Kercher, Kyle A.; Steinfeldt, Jesse A.; Rettke, Devin J.; Zuidema, Taylor R.; Walker, Miata J.; (Martinez) Kercher, Vanessa M.; Silveyra, Patricia; Seo, Dong-Chul; Macy, Jonathan T.; Hulvershorn, Leslie A.; Kawata, Keisuke; Psychiatry, School of Medicine
    Purpose: Age of first exposure to tackle football and head impact kinematics have been used to examine the effect of head impacts on mental health outcomes. These measures coupled with retrospective and cross-sectional designs have contributed to conflicting results. The purpose of this study was to identify the effect of one season of head impact exposure, age of first exposure to football, and psychological need satisfaction on acute mental health outcomes in adolescent football players. Methods: This prospective single-season cohort study used sensor-installed mouthguards to collect head impact exposure along with surveys to assess age of first exposure to football, psychological satisfaction, depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and thriving from football players at four high schools (n = 91). Linear regression was used to test the association of head impact exposure, age of first exposure, and psychological satisfaction with acute mental health outcomes. Results: A total of 9,428 impacts were recorded with a mean of 102 ± 113 impacts/player. Cumulative head impact exposure and age of first exposure were not associated with acute mental health outcomes at postseason or change scores from preseason to postseason. Greater psychological satisfaction was associated with fewer depressive symptoms (β = -0.035, SE = 0.008, p = < .001), fewer anxiety symptoms (β = -0.021, SE = 0.008, p = .010), and greater thriving scores (β = 0.278, SE = 0.040, p = < .001) at postseason. Discussion: This study does not support the premise that greater single-season head impact exposure or earlier age of first exposure to tackle football is associated with worse acute mental health indicators over the course of a single season in adolescent football players.
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    Association Between Proteomic Blood Biomarkers and DTI/NODDI Metrics in Adolescent Football Players: A Pilot Study
    (Frontiers Media, 2020-11-16) Kawata, Keisuke; Steinfeldt, Jesse A.; Huibregtse, Megan E.; Nowak, Madeleine K.; Macy, Jonathan T.; Kercher, Kyle; Rettke, Devin J.; Shin, Andrea; Chen, Zhongxue; Ejima, Keisuke; Newman, Sharlene D.; Cheng, Hu; Medicine, School of Medicine
    While neuroimaging and blood biomarker have been two of the most active areas of research in the neurotrauma community, these fields rarely intersect to delineate subconcussive brain injury. The aim of the study was to examine the association between diffusion MRI techniques [diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and neurite orientation/dispersion density imaging (NODDI)] and brain-injury blood biomarker levels [tau, neurofilament-light (NfL), glial-fibrillary-acidic-protein (GFAP)] in high-school football players at their baseline, aiming to detect cumulative neuronal damage from prior seasons. Twenty-five football players were enrolled in the study. MRI measures and blood samples were obtained during preseason data collection. The whole-brain, tract-based spatial statistics was conducted for six diffusion metrics: fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), axial/radial diffusivity (AD, RD), neurite density index (NDI), and orientation dispersion index (ODI). Five players were ineligible for MRIs, and three serum samples were excluded due to hemolysis, resulting in 17 completed set of diffusion metrics and blood biomarker levels for association analysis. Our permutation-based regression model revealed that serum tau levels were significantly associated with MD and NDI in various axonal tracts; specifically, elevated serum tau levels correlated to elevated MD (p = 0.0044) and reduced NDI (p = 0.016) in the corpus callosum and surrounding white matter tracts (e.g., longitudinal fasciculus). Additionally, there was a negative association between NfL and ODI in the focal area of the longitudinal fasciculus. Our data suggest that high school football players may develop axonal microstructural abnormality in the corpus callosum and surrounding white matter tracts, such as longitudinal fasciculus. A future study is warranted to determine the longitudinal multimodal relationship in response to repetitive exposure to sports-related head impacts.
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    Effectiveness of biomedical interventions on the chronic stage of traumatic brain injury: a systematic review of randomized controlled trials
    (Frontiers Media, 2024-03-18) Kawata, Keisuke; Rettke, Devin J.; Thompson, Christopher; Mannix, Rebekah; Bazarian, Jeffrey J.; Datta, Dibyadyuti; Exercise & Kinesiology, School of Health and Human Sciences
    Traumatic brain injury (TBI), in any form and severity, can pose risks for developing chronic symptoms that can profoundly hinder patients’ work/academic, social, and personal lives. In the past 3 decades, a multitude of pharmacological, stimulation, and exercise-based interventions have been proposed to ameliorate symptoms, memory impairment, mental fatigue, and/or sleep disturbances. However, most research is preliminary, thus limited influence on clinical practice. This review aims to systematically appraise the evidence derived from randomized controlled trials (RCT) regarding the effectiveness of pharmacological, stimulation, and exercise-based interventions in treating chronic symptoms due to TBI. Our search results indicate that despite the largest volume of literature, pharmacological interventions, especially using neurostimulant medications to treat physical, cognitive, and mental fatigue, as well as daytime sleepiness, have yielded inconsistent results, such that some studies found improvements in fatigue (e.g., Modafinil, Armodafinil) while others failed to yield the improvements after the intervention. Conversely, brain stimulation techniques (e.g., transcranial magnetic stimulation, blue light therapy) and exercise interventions were effective in ameliorating mental health symptoms and cognition. However, given that most RCTs are equipped with small sample sizes, more high-quality, larger-scale RCTs is needed.