This is a 4-year, longitudinal study of 100 active-duty Navy SEALs. The goal of the study is to determine whether repeated blast exposure affects SEAL brain health and to develop an initial diagnostic testing protocol that detects repeated blast brain injury.
Participants will travel to Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston, MA for a 1-day study visit at enrollment (baseline) and 1-year follow-up. At each visit to MGH, participants will have brain scans, blood tests, and assessments of cognitive performance, psychological health, and physical symptoms. Every 3 months between the baseline and follow-up visits to Boston, there will be brief (\~1 hour) assessments via phone or video teleconference.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
NA
Purpose
DIAGNOSTIC
Masking
NONE
Enrollment
100
Each SEAL participant will undergo brain imaging with PBR28 translocator protein (TSPO) positron emission tomography (PET) at study enrollment and at 1-year follow up.
Massachusetts General Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
RECRUITINGneuroimaging biomarkers
TSPO tracer uptake within the brain on TSPO PET, functional connectivity of the executive control, default and salience networks on resting-state functional MRI and diffusion MRI, and brain signal abnormalities on multidimensional MRI
Time frame: 1 year
blood biomarkers
tau, ptau, bd-tau, NF-L, GFAP, UCH-L1, IL-6, IL-10, TNF alpha
Time frame: 1 year
neuropsychiatric symptoms
Neurobehavioral Symptom Inventory
Time frame: 1 year
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