The mTBI Keystone Research Study did not begin in a vacuum. It rests on sixteen years of clinical observation and imaging work connecting the craniocervical junction (CCJ) to the neurological, vascular, and cerebrospinal-fluid disturbances that accompany persistent mild traumatic brain injury. This page is where the peer-reviewed literature, imaging findings, and clinical case series that motivated the trial will be collected.
What the existing evidence shows
Across the published record, three threads converge: mTBI symptoms frequently persist long after the expected recovery window; conventional imaging often reads as normal even when patients remain profoundly symptomatic; and structural assessment of the upper cervical spine repeatedly surfaces abnormalities that standard protocols never evaluate. The Keystone Study is designed to test whether those abnormalities are incidental or causal.
A living bibliography
As the study progresses, this page will host the full citation list, links to primary sources, and plain-language summaries of each finding, so that clinicians, funders, and journalists can trace every claim back to its evidence. Citable content gets cited — and every number on this site is meant to be checkable.
Until the reference list is published here, the research team’s plain-language reviews of relevant studies appear on the Blog.
Last updated September 16, 2026