Police are awaiting the results of a blood sample to determine if an impaired driving charge is warranted.

A 38-year-old woman is under investigation following a traffic stop by Corner Brook RCMP.

Officers made the stop in Cox’s Cove on the province’s west coast last Saturday night, reports local radio station VOCM.

According to officers, the woman showed signs of impairment and was arrested after a roadside test was positive for cannabis. Police are awaiting the results of a blood sample to determine if a drug-impaired driving charge is warranted.

Additionally, the woman was ticketed for having unsealed cannabis readily available in her vehicle.

The federal rules for transporting cannabis in a vehicle are similar to alcohol. It is illegal to do so if the cannabis is “unfastened” and not in its original packaging or if it’s not packed in baggage and is readily available to anyone in the vehicle.

While there are a variety of roadside tests to detect the presence of THC, there are no tests to check if cannabis levels have resulted in impairment.

Earlier this year, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital published a study in Neuropsychopharmacology detailing a non-invasive way of determining whether or not THC has resulted in impairment.

Investigators used functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), which measures brain patterns, and researchers then correlated this to THC impairment.

In a study of 169 people, researchers found those who had consumed cannabis showed higher levels of neural activity in the prefrontal cortex of the brain when compared to those given a placebo.

“Our research represents a novel direction for impairment testing in the field,” said lead author Jodi Gilman, associate professor at Harvard University and investigator in the Center for Addiction Medicine.

“Our goal was to determine if cannabis impairment could be detected from activity of the brain on an individual level. This is a critical issue because a breathalyser-type of approach will not work for detecting cannabis impairment, which makes it very difficult to objectively assess impairment from THC during a traffic stop,” Gilman added.