The next wave of concussion testing technology could come out of the University of Calgary.
Its researchers have been working to develop a portable brain-imaging system that would help diagnose concussions, detect damage and estimate recovery timelines. The system uses light to scan for signs of brain damage from a concussion-inducing injury and will be put to the test at the Alberta Children’s Hospital.
The brain images will be taken with near-infrared spectroscopy, which looks for oxygen levels and blood flow in the brain as signals that the brain’s hemispheres are communicating with each other, according to the University of Calgary. After a suspected concussion, the research shows that these oxygen levels and blood flow patterns change.
“The one thing we know is that there can be physiological changes in the brain that last for months to years after a brain injury due to concussion. We discovered a new technology that is portable to measure those changes,” Jeff Dunn, the director of the Experimental Imaging Center at the university, said in a statement. “We will now apply this new technology to see how important these changes are, as we try to understand how concussion evolves over time.”
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The test involves a head cap that is fitted with LED lights and connected sensors that beam the brain image to a computer. During the test run at the children’s hospital, the research team led by Dunn will evaluate children over time to see how the brain is responding and recovering from the concussion.
“We will be able to follow young patients over time to establish whether this new technology can help us determine the extent of the injury and how the brain is recovering,” Dunn told the university.
Depending on the results of the trial, the technology could become a useful tool in solving the concussion testing problem so pervasive on the sidelines of NFL games and in many other sports as well.
SportTechie Takeaway:
This portable technology is the latest to suggest an answer to the vexing question of on-field concussion testing and diagnosis. Its ease of portability could be a strong selling point for sports organizations looking for a different way of testing for damage to the brain. Once it reaches the market it will be competing with technologies such as NFL 1st & Future finalist EyeGuide and SyncThink’s EYE-SYNC, both of which promise instantaneous concussion detection. The brain imaging also follows on the heels of research at Purdue University, where scientists are developing a blood biomarker test for detecting brain trauma. The University of Calgary’s device is far from the only possible solution on the market, but it does approach the problem in a unique way that could help it break into major sports organizations, provided it works as anticipated in the upcoming trial at Alberta Children’s Hospital.