Australian Football League player becomes first female athlete to be diagnosed with CTE

A former Australian rules football player has been diagnosed with chronic traumatic encephalopathy in a landmark finding for female professional athletes.

The Concussion Legacy Foundation said Heather Anderson, who played for Adelaide in the Australian Football League Women's competition, is the first female athlete diagnosed with CTE, the degenerative brain disease linked to concussions.

Researchers at the Australian Sports Brain Bank, established in 2018 and co-founded by the Concussion Legacy Foundation, diagnosed Anderson as having had low-stage CTE and three lesions in her brain.