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Why the Third International Summit on Repetitive Brain Trauma Could Change the Future of Brain Health | Broken Brains Podcast · Broken Brains with Bruce Parkman

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Hey folks, Bruce Parkman here with another uh episode of Broken Brains, where we talk about the issues of uh repetitive brain trauma from two aspects repetitive impacts uh with our athletes and repetitive blast exposure for our veterans and what these two conditions or what these conditions are doing to the mental health and well-being of our veterans, children, and athletes.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: And as the official podcast of the Mack Parkman Foundation, our focus is to bring awareness of this situation to you, because this is not taught or trained in any of our nursing, medical, psychological, suicide prevention communities, which makes you the front line for those that you love.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Today, I want to give you a little bit of, I want to give you an update on our summit.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: This is our third summit on repetitive brain trauma that will be held here in Tampa at the Center for Advanced Medical Learning and Simulation in partnership with the University of South Florida at uh that you know, the the camels, what they call it, camels, is an amazing learning institution.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's pretty much brand new.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's got lime green lights, which is pretty cool.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And it's right in downtown Tampa, which means our summit is right in the middle of a lot of extracurricular activities to participate in.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: And Tampa's a very lively uh city.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: This year, uh the outgoing commander of the United States Special Operations Command General Brian Fenton has accepted a the keynote speaker slot, as well as uh Robert Gallery, who's a highly experienced NFL player and very and significant advocate for brain optimization for athletes that um are transitioning their careers from sport to you know to life as they as they move on.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um we are right now in the middle of finalizing the agenda.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: We've got sports players, we've got we got all players from all aspects of life, doctors from neurology, doctors from pathology.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: We've got uh research studies that have shown enormous uh you know uh uh uh discoveries in brain health, brain optimization.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: We've got technical experts, and the whole summit is built around the concept of hope.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Because there is hope now.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: When we started the summit three years ago, we didn't have much hope at all.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: My son has just passed, we're starting dealing with tragedies.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: We did not know that, we just thought we had this big, massive struggle.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: And our messaging now has changed from one of yes, this is the largest preventable cause of mental illness in this country.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: But it's all about optimizing the brains of those that decide to play contact sports.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: So not only can they have long, healthy lives, but they can be better players.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: And this all comes together in two tracks.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna have one track for military veterans, where we talk about the issues of blast exposure.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: What is blast exposure?
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: How does it impact the body, the brain, and how is that tied to mental illness?
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: And we have uh you know, we have an amazing agenda of specialists from the treatment industry, specialists from the technique, the technology industry, uh, specialists from the actual, you know, the military, uh, the military community itself to sit down and talk about these are the issues that we're having with our veterans, and this is how we move forward and still have the most lethal military on the planet, but also have healthy soldiers.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, being in the military, you know, shouldn't condemn you to a path of hopelessness and despair.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately, with the lack of understanding of the issues, it's caused a lot of pain in our community, which is now being addressed by the United States military.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why General Fenton's speaking is so important, because General Fenton's uh approach to brain, he pretty much led uh the military's approach to brain, uh to improving the brain health of our soldiers and reducing the exposure to blast.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: An amazing, amazing gentleman and and just an amazing general.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that uh his presence says a lot about the impact that this summit is having on the issue of repetitive brain trauma.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And he's gonna have some amazing uh things to say, and we we can't wait to you know to welcome him.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: On the other side, the other track is on contact sports, and this is where we're going to be diving into not not talking not focused on the tragedies that have occurred from players that have participated in contact sports for too long, but again, focusing on building awareness, identifying and treating these people, and as is and also policy.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: How do we change this problem?
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: How do we how do we make it better?
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, through you know, reducing exposure till you know the age of 14, when children help uh go into high school, and a lot of people say, well, you know, should they should never play contact sports?
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I would probably agree with that, but many won't.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: And we have free will, God's given us to that to us.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: But by taking the contact out of practice and getting coaches to understand that children and players are way more important than wins and losses.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so, how do we address that?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: How do we build the awareness?
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: How do we how do we create a whole new paradigm around contact sports where, hey man, contact sports are fun and they don't hurt all the time.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, they're gonna hurt when you play them, but they shouldn't hurt you for the rest of your life.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: So we've got uh NFL players, we've got, I mean, we've got players from all sports coming in, we've got coaches, uh, we've got parents whose unfortunately children are in jail or are being institutionalized or have gone through horrific changes because nobody was aware about this.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: So it's all about building that compelling story that yes, we have had a lot of pain associated with this, but there's also hope.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what goes to um the underlying thread of both of these uh agendas is that there is hope, that there are treatments that can help, and that that that you know that we need to push for more of them to be available, and they should be covered by insurance because this is impacting so much of America.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: And then overly, this whole thing is all about the issue of brain optimization.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: And if we treated brain health with the passion that we treat cardiovascular health or neurological health, then we could have such a significant impact on this country in terms of lower domestic abuse, violent crime, mental illness, unemployment, incarceration, you name it, and improved population health, you know, improved parenting, improved, you know, employment and work attitude, improved GDP, nothing can impact this country more than being able to say that we are improving the brain health of our population, which is absolutely possible.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what we have coming up.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: We're excited again, September 16th and 17th at the Center for Advanced Medical Learning and Simulation here in Tampa.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: We have uh you know, coordinated with hotel rooms around town.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: We'll have you know activities that a list of activities for everybody to come in and enjoy, and it is really a remarkable time.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: The people, we always get comments like, how do you find these people?
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: They find us.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because this issue is not just for researchers and scientists anymore.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: This res this issue of repetitive brain trauma is for that soldier, it's for that parent, it's for that child, that player, it's for that that that you know that that retired player, it's for the scientist, it's for the doctor, it's for the nurse, the the suicide prevention specialist.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, this is an issue for everybody, and we're seeing it literally touch everybody as we go through life.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so this this summit right now is the only one in the world on this issue, and we are leading the way on getting to the next steps, which is building awareness, legislation, continuing medical education credits, which will be part of our summit as well.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: So, those of you that need your CMEs, please come down.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna make sure that uh you're gonna get approved for those CMEs working on that.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's gonna be a great time.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: One big haul, networking, uh community building, and just sharing each other's stories so that we can take it from here and grow this every year until guess what?
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have a problem anymore.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: Might not be in my lifetime, but we're not gonna stop trying.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: So we hope to see you at the third International Summit for Repetitive Brain Trauma here in September.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we have a golf course on Friday, just so you know.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is one of the most unique golf courses, golf tournaments you've ever played.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: 100% of all the monies raised go to veterans and veterans uh and mental health services.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: But you're gonna be able to push a Humvee for time, shoot a golf ball out of an M4, you're gonna have to wear body armor to play one of the par threes, and I think you're gonna be able to carry one of your butter's buddies in a medical litter for time.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of different, you know, just just different ways to have some fun, additional trophies that you can win.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: You might not be the best golfer, but you might be able to push that Humvee better than anybody else out there.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: So you can win a trophy.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: I guess not one of them golf course tournaments where everybody gets a trophy, but it's gonna be a lot of fun.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you'd love to sponsor or participate and buy a foresome or sponsor a whole, please reach out to the uh foundation and we'll make sure that we take care of you and get you uh recognized as being a part of this community that's trying to solve this challenging problem.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for listening to us here on the uh Broken Brains Podcast.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: I am your host, Bruce Parkman, the official podcast of the Mac Parkman Foundation.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: Don't forget, if you got a chance, get to our website.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: The book has just been revised, updated.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it should be there in about two weeks.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's also going to be in Spanish.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's for free.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Free.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure you get that book.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I really appreciate the time.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: And do remember your children only have one brain.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: And take care of that, puppy.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll see you next time on Broken Brains.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much, and God bless you.