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CTE stands for chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease caused by repeated to the head. The disease is especially prevalent among military veterans and professional athletes like American football players.

How is CTE pronounced?

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The first description of CTE was by Dr. Harrison Martland in 1928, who described boxers as having punch-drunk syndrome. While researchers would discover instances of similar behavior (, speech , mental slowness, muscular issues) in boxers and other brain trauma victims over the next 75 years, they didn’t confirm exactly what the cause was in most cases.

In 2002, Dr. Bennet Omalu examined the body of former Pittsburgh Steelers football player Mike Webster, who’d been behaving shortly before his death. Dr. Omalu determined the tragic nature of Webster’s brain trauma and named the condition chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Dr. Omalu published a major paper about CTE in Neurosurgery, a prominent medical journal, in 2005 about its in NFL players. Resulting from multiple head injuries, such as can happen with tackles and collisions in football, CTE significantly affects behavior (), mood (), and (memory loss). Extreme cases are linked to .

Over the next several years, the NFL has been accused of trying to discredit Dr. Omalu’s work. Dr. Omalu went on, however, to study additional football players and attract other medical experts to assist him in his research. The discovery of CTE and Dr. Omalu’s story were portrayed in the 2015 film Concussion, which further spread awareness of CTE to a wider audience.

By the late 2010s, CTE research and awareness had advanced to the point that it had massive effects on football and athletics in general. The NFL was involved in a number of -related lawsuits and took strides to improve their policies and image, including donating millions to brain research.

Some active and former NFL players began to discourage parents from allowing children to participate in full-tackle football, and the NFL altered the rules to disallow any player who suffered a concussion during play to immediately reenter the game. By 2016, MMA fighters and professional wrestlers were also being diagnosed with CTE—and pursuing lawsuits against their professional organizations.

Enforcer 's Brain Injury Case Ends With Supreme Court Denial. An autopsy confirmed he suffered from , a degenerative brain condition associated with ice hockey and other head-banging sports. Played for .

— Bruce Rolfsen (@OSHAReporter)

CTE has rocked the world of sports since it gained national attention in the 2000s. Public concerns for player safety has led to many people taking issue with the big hits many have argued have been used as the main allure of watching contact sports. The acronym CTE is frequently used by doctors, journalists, athletes, lawyers, sports organizations, and public health and policy experts.

“It is clear, & has been for many decades, that hockey players face an increased risk of long-term neurodegenerative diseases such as because of the head trauma they experience in the NHL,” Dr. Cantu wrote in the Feb. 6, 2018, declaration ⁦.

— Daniel Carcillo (@CarBombBoom13)

Please listen to and talk to about the NFL in the current social moment that we live in. The evidence about traumatic brain injury and CTE is overwhelming. Will it take a player dying on the field for America to abandon the sport?

— Abraham Gutman🔥 (@abgutman)

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More examples of CTE

“Snoop Dogg Proud Of His Son For Quitting Football After Studying Dangers Of CTE”
—Chantilly Post, HotNewHipHop (headline), September 2018

“im glad the NFL made all these rule changes. the players are people, not just entertainment. CTE is a very dangerous thing, and giving athletes CTE just for your entertainment and “big hit football” isn’t right. it’s dehumanizing.”
—@ian_barthel24, September 2018

This content is not meant to be a formal definition of this term. Rather, it is an informal summary that seeks to provide supplemental information and context important to know or keep in mind about the term’s history, meaning, and usage.