AAN: Super Bowl hero receives award for advocating awareness of TBI

Kathy Mahdoubi | | Health Imaging | Molecular Imaging

Today the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) will be presenting a leadership in neurology award to Ben Utecht, a National Football League champion who suffered a traumatic brain injury (TBI) that tackled his career in 2009.

Since then, the former tight end for the Cinncinati Bengals has been spreading word about the dangers of TBI and is now working with the American Brain Foundation. The award is being presented during the AAN annual meeting being held until May 3 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia.

“I am incredibly humbled to be honored with the 2014 public leadership in neurology award and for my name to be placed alongside such an esteemed group of former recipients,” Utecht reportedly said in an AAN news release. “My life has been impacted by traumatic brain injury and brain disease, challenging me and my family constantly. Brain disease threatens to steal from us what makes us human, and I will fight relentlessly to see that through research we can in fact find the origins of healing through the cures that are waiting to be discovered.”

Those who take home the award are honored for increasing public awareness, furthering research and improving patient care for those with neurologic disease.

 

Kathy Mahdoubi

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