Getty Image / David Eulitt
Since the NFL reached a class action settlement in 2015 with players, over $1.2 billion has been paid out to more than 1,600 former NFL players and their families but a new investigation from the Washington Post has found disturbing evidence of players being denied critical aid to pay for potentially life-saving healthcare.
Findings from the WaPo investigation were published today and they found multiple instances of former NFL players diagnosed with dementia by their own doctors who were denied coverage through the NFL’s concussion settlement, former players who then died from complications died to dementia.
The summary of their findings include:
“The settlement’s definition for dementia requires more impairment than the standard definition used in the United States. Several doctors who have evaluated players told The Post that if they used the settlement’s definition in regular care, they would routinely fail to diagnose dementia in ailing patients. “I assumed this was written this way, on purpose, just to save the NFL money,” said Carmela Tartaglia, an associate professor of neurology at the University of Toronto.”
“At least 14 players have, like Cross, failed to qualify for settlement money or medical care and then died, only to have CTE confirmed via autopsy. Eight of these players were diagnosed in life with dementia or a related memory disorder but still failed to qualify for settlement benefits.”
“In more than 70 cases reviewed by The Post, players were diagnosed with dementia by board-certified doctors, only to see their claims denied by the administrative law firm that oversees the settlement. While the NFL has often blamed denied claims on fraud, none of the denials reviewed by The Post contained allegations of fraud. Instead, records show, settlement review doctors simply overruled physicians who actually evaluated players, often blaming dementia symptoms on other health problems also linked to concussions, including depression and sleep apnea.”
For its part, the NFL points to over $1.2 billion having been paid out so far to over 1,600 former players and their families. It’s a figure that far exceeds the expectations prior to the settlement and the NFL used that as evidence they’ve exceeded their obligation.
But the numbers tell a different story.
Since 2017, ~900 claims involving dementia have been approved by the NFL while 1,100 dementia claims have been denied. And of those 1,100 dementia claims the NFL has denied, roughly 300 of them were players who had already been diagnosed with dementia by the their own doctors.
The findings of this study are concerning for numerous reasons, most notably that former NFL players who suffered concussions and consequent CTE leading to dementia are not being taken care of and receiving the critical care they were promised.