Page 21 - Brain Scan News Today

>> and that something i witnessed firsthand driving around with 19-year-old chaz moore. the day i spent with him, he had been smoking all day long. >> do you feel impaired at all? >> no, i dont. i feel normal. >> turns out, when you test people who have a lot of experience with cannabis, you dont see many disruptions. but if you test people who have sort of a limited history with cannabis, you can see some clear pronounced disruptions. >> of course, no one thinks that driving when using marijuan...

Eighth grader has any brain activity, proof to the hospital that doctors should not remove the ventilator. as they wait, the family has also presented the hospital with a court order to stop doctors from removing jahis life support. >> regardless of the results now, with this in place, they still cant move. this letter is going to buy us time. thats all weve been asking for is time. this letter is going to buy us time. >> an official told cnn the hospital decides if jahi should stay on life supp...

Tape, seemingly fast asleep. many victims of something called micro-sleep. episodes of sleep as brief as a few seconds. your eyes could be open but your brain is asleep. >> micro-sleep is a brief transition from wakefulness to sleep. it can last up to maybe 20 to 30 seconds. >> reporter: tuesday night i found out firsthand when investigating the effect of sleep deprivation on driving. staying awake 30 hours and wired up behind the wheel on a test track. i thought i had done okay but my brain sca...

Will bind to these abnormal proteins that we see in cte. so if you have them in your brain, it can diagnose this in a living person. >> reporter: nurn julian bails, former physician for pittsburgh steelers is part of the team that devised this brain scan. he acknowledges it is too early to tell if the test is reliable, sample size is too small and results need to be peer reviewed. it is believed cte played a role in the death of former players dave duerson, junior sao and others. allen schwartz ...

Against the philadelphia eagles was the worst one tony dorset ever took. he says hits like that left him with menacing symptoms, depression, outbursts of temper. >> not remembering. i been taking my daughters to practice for years and all of a sudden i forget how to get there, have to ask my wife how do you get there. >> reporter: dorsett doesnt know how many concussions he got in his hall of fame career or during four seasons in college, but he is one of nine former nfl players that had a new b...

12-year hall of fame career or during his four seasons in college, but hes one of nine former nfl players who have had a new brain scan that may help identify chronic traumatic encephalopathy or cte, a brain disease caused by head trauma linked to dementia and depression. dorsett says hes tested positive for symptoms consistent with cte. previously, the only way to find out if someone had cte was after their death, with an autopsy on the brain. now -- >> this test involves a tracer which is inje...

My short temperedness, im very short tempered. it gets worse. >> at his lowest moments, dorsett says he has thought about suicide. >> yeah, ive thought about crazy stuff, sort of like, why do i need to keep continue going through this. i mean, im too -- too smart of a person, i like to think, to take my life, but its crossed my mind. >> reporter: neurosurgen julian bales is part of a medical team that says its devised a brain scan to identify signs of cte in a living person. dorsett is one of ni...

In the deaths of former nfl players dave duerson, junior seau and others. but some say the nfl brushed aside early key research. >> each one of those steps from 2005 through 2009 was met with a response from the nfl that this evidence did not really mean anything. one of the doctors on the lead committee called an important study virtually worthless, thats a direct quote. >> reporter: but the nfl changed and in late 2009, acknowledged some of the lingering effects from head injuries. it also rec...

What is more cloer though, is the effect of marijuana on the young brain. >> what we think is a big difference in people who begin to smoke prior to age 16 and those who smoke after ang 16. what we call early versus later onset. >> the brain scan shows the white matter, highways that help the brain communicate from one point to another, are impaired, in those who start smoking early. >> there is underlined white matter. >> that is your concern, sounds like. that those highways, white matter high...

People who ask why? >> more than anything its -- why not? i have this formerly death sentence which is being extended out. as long as i am feeling well, i might as well dance. if anybody has even the slightest inspiration or push toward life, while were living, mission accomplished. >> reporter: another mission of hers, to beat the cancer. >> each two-month increment, the brain scan has looked better. >> reporter: while doctors say the potential for bone weakness and exhaustion are possible conc...