UCF Hosts NFL Event
The City of Orlando’s hosting of the Pro Bowl brought more than just football games. The University of Central Florida welcomed 55 retired NFL players to campus on Saturday, January 28 for the NFL Player Association Pro Bowl Health Symposium. This was the largest attendance of former pros at an NFL Players Association sponsored health-screening event in the program’s history.
The event consisted of private health screenings for the former players and a public health symposium in the UCF Psychology Building. Many speakers, including UCF President John C. Hitt, Ph.D., Director of NFL Players Association Professional Athletes Foundation Fund Andre Collins, Christopher Seeger, who served as the chief negotiator in the NFL concussion-injury lawsuit and UCF professors from the Department of Psychology and the Department of Health Professions addressed the audience during the symposium.
UCF Clinical Associate Professor Megan Sherod, Ph.D., and UCF Assistant Professor Nichole Lighthall, Ph.D., both from the Department of Psychology, gave presentations on the cognitive consequences of concussions and the aging human brain. Other UCF faculty included Pegasus Professor and Trustee Chair Peter Hancock, Ph.D., and Physical Therapy Program Director Patrick Pabian, P.T. Lighthall organized the symposium for UCF.
The symposium was intended for students, researchers, trainers, coaches, athletic directors, amateur athletes, sports enthusiasts and the general public to gain a better understanding not only of the cause and effects of concussion, but the testing and treatment following a closed head injury. Members of the public were also invited to attend the symposium to see the exhibits and meet the players at no charge.
The symposium was a collaboration between the players association and NFL Players Association Athletes’ Foundation, Athlete’s Health, the Living Heart Foundation, the University of Central Florida and Hitachi Healthcare America. This is the fourteenth year of Living Heart Foundation’s former pro NFL health screening program.
