Muhammad Ali’s doctors release new evidence ‘proving’ boxing trauma did not cause neurological symptoms

His clinical course post-retirement points to early onset idiopathic Parkinson's disease as his primary diagnosis, not boxing-related dementia, they say
Muhammad Ali knocking down Sonny Liston (1965). Photo Alamy

Boxing legend Muhammad Ali’s prominent neurological symptoms — namely, the left-arm rest tremor — were not the result of boxing-related head trauma, his doctors have revealed. 

Instead, the medicos who treated him for 20 years after his professional career say “The Greatest” had early-onset idiopathic Parkinson’s disease. 

Six years after the heavyweight boxer’s death, they have been given permission from Ali’s family to publish evidence challenging the long-held view he had dementia pugilistica secondary to repeated head trauma. 

Writing in JAMA Neurology, Dr Michael Okun from the University of Florida and his co-authors say clinical records pertaining to his neurological care between 1995-2016 fill in “missing information to the archives of history”.