The NFL Players Association https://nflpa.com and Cleveland Clinic https://myclevelandclinic.org is going to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to better characterize neurological disease, improve diagnosis, predict disease progression, and guide treatments.
The research aims to not only improve the brain health of former NFL players, but also enhance cognitive well-being among other athletes and the larger community.
The Initiative will develop Machine Learning Algorithms related to cognitive impairment using long term patient outcomes data. The NFL Players Association and the Cleveland Clinic will develop Explainable AI (XAI) models while using machine learning tools and data such as demographics, patient-entered data, along with imaging and results from labs. When applied to disease progression modeling, this may make it possible for long term pathological trajectories to be obtained from short term clinical data.
Also, the use of XAI techniques and machine learning tools will offer an opportunity to build models by studying patients who did not play professional football while at the same time informing potential prevention and treatment programs for the benefit of the current and former player population. These models will aid in the care and treatment of individuals in rural and underserved communities.
The NFL Players Association and the Cleveland Clinic also seek to engage other partners in the medical and analytic space to create a coordinated research network that will evaluate and conduct phased research projects.
The Proposals resulting from this venture will be published so that it is possible to include additional machine leaning and analytical projects specific to identifying and providing insight into neurological disease progression, as well as to corresponding treatment patterns.