Study Tracks Early Symptoms of Traumatic Brain Disease

A new study offers clues to early symptoms of a brain disease linked with head trauma that has affected football players and other athletes. The study focused on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). This disease causes brain damage that gets worse over time. People with CTE often are depressed and may show impulsive or erratic behavior. The new study included 36 male athletes who had been diagnosed with CTE after death. Their ages when they died ranged from 17 to 98. Most of them had played football as professionals or amateurs. The rest had been involved in hockey, wrestling or boxing. Researchers interviewed their relatives and asked about early symptoms related to thinking or behavior. They found that 22 of the athletes had behavior or mood problems as their first symptoms of CTE. Eleven had memory or thinking problems first. Three had no symptoms up to their time of death.