National Football League

CTE research moves on, even without the NFL's money

Published Jun. 1, 2016 8:03 p.m. ET

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BOSTON (AP) Researchers are moving ahead with efforts to develop a diagnostic test for chronic traumatic encephalopathy (ehn-sehf-uh-LAH'-thuh-pee) - even without the NFL's help.

Some of the nation's top brain scientists gathered Wednesday at the Boston University School of Medicine for the start of a research project designed to find a test for CTE and identify its risk factors. For now, the disease increasingly found in former football players can only be diagnosed during an autopsy.

The project had originally been slated to receive money that the NFL earmarked for concussion research. But the league's complaints about Boston University researchers led the National Institutes of Health to pay for it with other funds.

Doctors at the meeting said they were looking ahead, to the research, and not dwelling on the political maneuvering that delayed its start.