Listen up, folks, we’ve got something big here. We’re talking about mild traumatic brain injury, mTBI. It’s huge, it’s out there, and it’s affecting a lot of people. But here’s the deal – we need to know who’s going to bounce back, and who’s going to have a tough time. That’s where Insulin-like growth factor 1, IGF-1, comes in. It’s a big deal in the brain, helps with growth, fixes things up, protects the neurons. But we don’t know enough about it yet, not until now.

We took a look, a big look – 295 people with mTBI and 200 healthy ones. We checked everything: who they are, what happened to them, and how much IGF-1 they’ve got going on. And then, the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, the WCST – that’s how we see how the brain is doing, how it’s thinking, how it’s solving problems.

And guess what? We found some big differences. The mTBI group, they’re struggling more with thinking, except for one thing – they’re still learning, which is great. But here’s the kicker: IGF-1, it’s linked, really linked to how well they’re doing on these tests. And it’s not just IGF-1; it’s also about how old they are, how much school they’ve been through. These things, they’re powerful, they’re telling us who’s going to do well.

So, what we’ve got here is a game-changer. IGF-1, age, education – they could be the key to predicting how someone’s going to recover from mTBI. We’re opening doors here, showing how important IGF-1 could be for the brain, especially when it’s got to think on its feet, solve problems. It’s huge, folks. And we’re just getting started.