Tom Pelissero

USA TODAY Sports

A doctor criticized in a congressional report alleging the NFL attempted to influence the selection process for a research grant is getting support from a somewhat unlikely source.

The University of Washington’s school of medicine is in the midst of reviewing the report’s criticism of Dr. Richard Ellenbogen, a professor and chairman of the department of neurological surgery at the school who doubles as co-chair of the NFL’s Head, Neck and Spine Committee. Ellenbogen has denied trying to steer a $16 million grant away from researchers at Boston University.

On Thursday, Dr. Robert Cantu – co-founder of the center for studying the neurodegenerative disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy at BU and a consultant on the study the grant will fund – sent a letter to the dean of UW Medicine defending Ellenbogen’s integrity and saying he’s upset over the way Ellenbogen has been treated by the media since the report’s release.

“Dean (Paul G.) Ramsey, Rich Ellenbogen does not deserve any negative press for all the wonderful work he has and is doing to make sports safer, especially football,” Cantu’s letter concludes. “I want you to know he has my complete support.”

A senior advisor to the NFL committee Ellenbogen co-chairs, Cantu told USA TODAY Sports the NFL asked him to write the letter, which also praises a league that has “committed to educating the players about the dangers of head injury and committed more millions of dollars by far to head injury research than any other sports organization.”

Doctor criticized in congressional report on concussion research counters claims

Cantu’s letter doesn’t address the specific allegations against Ellenbogen, who told USA TODAY Sports soon after the May 23 release of the Democratic Staff Report of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that no one ever contacted him to get his side of the story.

The National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke ended up using other funding, rather than some of the $30 million the NFL committed to research into head injuries, toward the study. Dr. Robert Stern, clinical core director of the BU Alzheimer’s Disease and CTE Center, will serve as lead principal investigator.

“There’s no question I feel somewhat in the middle, because I greatly respect and work with Ann (McKee, the BU center’s associate director) and Bob,” Cantu told USA TODAY Sports. “But (the letter is) all about what I know about Rich first-hand. It’s not about any dealings with the NIH. It’s talking about a long, 30-year history of working with and respecting and finding this guy to be of the highest integrity.”

Asked if he has ever known the NFL to try to influence grant selection, Cantu said, “I have had absolutely zero knowledge of that, no.”

Cantu is a clinical professor of neurology and neurosurgery at BU. He’s also medical director and director of clinical research at the Dr. Robert C. Cantu Concussion Center at Emerson Hospital in Concord, Mass., among other duties.

After the report’s release, Ellenbogen acknowledged having two phone calls with NINDS director Dr. Walter Koroshetz, but said they were about his belief in the need for a longitudinal study on the effects of concussion and he never told Koroshetz not to give the grant to BU. Ellenbogen pointed to his work lobbying all 50 states to pass the so-called Zackery Lystedt Law as evidence of his commitment to studying the issue of traumatic brain injury in athletes, particularly young ones.

The NFL issued its own statement rejecting the allegations in the congressional report, pointing out its past contributions to research – including $6 million for a study by the BU School of Medicine and U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs – and saying the league “is deeply committed to continuing to accelerate scientific research and advancements in this critical area, and we stand ready to support additional independent research to that end.”

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