CHICAGO (NewsNation Now) — An ex-NFL player accused of fatally shooting six people in South Carolina earlier this year was suffering from severe CTE, doctors say.

Boston University neuropathologist Dr. Ann McKee, who joined “The Donlon Report,” said Phillip Adams, 32, had stage 2 chronic traumatic encephalopathy — a degenerative brain disease that is often found in the brains of football players. McKee also said that Adams’ case was very different from other players his age.

“What was different about his case was the severity of the involvement of the frontal lobes,” McKee said. “The frontal lobes damage can cause all sorts of issues like impulsivity, poor decision making, poor judgment, emotional volatility. It can cause rage behaviors, violent tendencies, paranoia. He was suffering from a brain disease that contributed substantially to his behavioral abnormalities.” 

The killings in South Carolina raised questions about Adams’ mental health. On April 7, authorities say, Adams killed Rock Hill physician Robert Lesslie; his wife, Barbara; two of their grandchildren, 9-year-old Adah Lesslie and 5-year-old Noah Lesslie; and two HVAC technicians working at the Lesslie home, James Lewis and Robert Shook, both 38. Police later found Adams with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

McKee noted Adams was seeking help for his mental health before the shooting. She said since the disease is linked to mood changes and memory loss, it was very hard for Adams to get the help he needed.

“You’re asking [a] person who’s impaired, who’s having trouble with planning … having trouble with their memory and they’re being asked to make many medical appointments to travel, to see specific doctors, to fill out all sorts of paperwork that would be challenging for a person who is completely intact. And so these individuals fall through the cracks, they can’t complete the diagnostic tests, they can’t get the medical evaluations.”

McKee said the bottom line is that the NFL needs to do more to protect its players.

“I have seen 315 former NFL players diagnosed with this disease and many of these players try to get help and can’t get help. If especially these players become socially isolated, they often lose contact with their families, they lose their job. This disease causes them to become unlovable and unlikeable, so they lose their social contact, they get lost in the system, they fall through the cracks.” 

CTE, which can only be diagnosed through an autopsy, has been found in former members of the military, football players, boxers and others who have been subjected to repeated head trauma. One recent study found signs of the debilitating disease in 110 of 111 NFL players whose brains were inspected. But McKee said they are working around the clock on a better system to detect the disease.

“We are getting closer and closer every day with blood tests, CSF tests, brain scans, and there’s a massive effort” to improve diagnosis. “:Imagine how it will change when a player can come to you and say, ‘I have this diagnosis.'”