Concussions in the NFL: Health risk for players, PR disaster for the league

Employing an unqualified medical expert

The NFL got off on the wrong foot in 1994 when then-commissioner Paul Tagliabue attempted to address the problem of head injuries among players by forming the Committee on Mild Traumatic Brain Injury. The purpose of the committee was to prevent injury and collect and analyze data related to concussions and post-concussion syndrome.

While the goals committee were noble, they was poorly executed. Incredibly, the person Tagliabue chose to chair the committee, Dr. Elliot Pellman, was a rheumatologist with no background in neurology.

How then did Pellman secure this job? He was Tagliabue’s personal physician. Predictably, the NFL denied that this relationship had anything to do with Pellman’s selection, releasing a statement through spokesman Greg Aiello: “No personal medical care had anything to do with Dr. Pellman’s appointment to the committee in 1994.”

Also true, no expertise relevant to brain trauma had anything to do with Pellman’s appointment to the committee. Pellman ended up resigning as chair in 2007, but his role on the committee continued. This was especially problematic not only because of his personal relationship with Tagliabue and his lack of expertise in neurological matters, but also because he had falsified and exaggerated his qualifications.

A former president of the NFL Physician’s Society, Pellman claimed he earned a medical degree from the State University of New York at Stony Brook when in reality he attended medical school in Guadalajara, Mexico. He also falsely claimed he was an associate clinical professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, when he was really just an assistant, a largely honorary position. Pellman continued claiming he was a fellow of the American College of Physicians six years after he stopped paying his dues.

Dr. Dan Brock, director of Harvard Medical School’s Division of Medical Ethics said via the New York Times in 2005, “If I told you I graduated from medical school in the United States, and I went to Guadalajara, then I think I would have deliberately misled you, so I would say that is unethical.”

In 2003 Pellman, the man initially tasked with exploring the issue of head trauma in the NFL back in 1994, was a team doctor for the Jets and sent receiver Wayne Chrebet back into the game after he had been knocked out.

Next: Shady science