Subpoena Cena: Does WWE Medical Director Joseph Maroon’s ImPACT System Manage Concussions – Or Merely ‘Manage’ ‘Concussions’?

PREVIOUSLY:

• “Introducing ‘What the Feds Must Investigate About WWE-NFL Doc Joseph Maroon’s ImPACT Concussion Product’”

John Cena, World Wrestling Entertainment’s top star, is funny enough to kill. In January 2010 he posted notes on Twitter about suffering a concussion in a televised skit and undergoing WWE medical director Joseph Maroon’s patented ImPACT testing before being cleared to return to action.(See http://wrestlingbabylon.wordpress.com/2010/06/11/did-he-or-didnt-he-john-cenas-soap-opera-concussion/.) Earlier this month he tweeted again about suffering a new concussion and undergoing ImPACT testing before, presto!, jumping right back into the wrestling tour, media appearances, and TV tapings. (See http://wrestlingbabylon.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/wwe%E2%80%99s-john-cena-has-new-concussion-%E2%80%93-or-%E2%80%98concussion%E2%80%99/.)

Yes, pro wrestlers do ridiculous things to themselves and each other, which cause real concussions – that has been extensively documented here. However, it is highly unlikely that Cena’s January 2010 and March 2011 Internet postings were anything other than hype for each year’s WrestleMania show.

So for concussion investigators I have the following question: Dr. Maroon takes money from WWE … is promoted on its website as the director of its “wellness program” … yet allows his best-known and personally developed clinical tool to be used repeatedly as a prop for fictional shtick … what does that tell us about the doctor, WWE, and his No. 1 client, the National Football League?

Senator Tom Udall needs to ask John Cena to testify at football helmet safety hearings, along with Maroon and Thad Ide, the chief engineer for the Riddell helmet company. I’m confident that the co-sponsor of Udall’s legislation, Senator Richard Blumenthal from WWE’s home state of Connecticut, can lend a hand in issuing the subpoena.

Maroon told The New York Times that Riddell helmet promos stretched the safety claims of the Neurosurgery journal article he had co-authored with Ide and with NFL grant money – though Maroon never said a word about his alleged displeasure until the feds were on the case. Presumably, with WWE, the soap opera “medical director” would disclaim responsibility for scripted medical subplots.

And, of course, many people readily see through Cena and WWE’s bad jokes about concussions (among other subjects). But the same is not true of the NFL’s management of head injuries, which is also done with a nod and wink toward reliance on Maroon’s ImPACT.

This year’s Super Bowl featured two quarterbacks, Aaron Rodgers and Ben Roethlisberger, who both had had recent concussion episodes. If you think they were returned to play under some pure and objective medical standard, then you are naïve.

That’s OK: professional athletes and entertainers – football players and wrestlers and their handlers – take crazy risks for millions of dollars. Their adoring public doesn’t necessarily need to know all the details. What’s troubling about ImPACT is that amateur and youth sports leagues also use it, and its appeal is based largely on the NFL propaganda-manufactured illusion that it is a reliable return-to-play standard, rather than just a slightly more sophisticated diagnostic toy and band-aid.

Tomorrow: history of ImPACT and the controversy of its use in the NFL.

Irv Muchnick