Technology being developed to detect concussions
 As a parent with a child involved in sports, the dangers of concussions going undetected is becoming a growing concern. Unfortunately detecting a concussion is not a trivial task. All too often athletes continue to play after sustaining concussions. We see concussions not detected at all levels of sports from recreational leagues to Pro leagues. Concussion sustaining blows in the NFL can be missed by trained medical staff, how can recreation league coaches be expected to make the correct call to allow children to continue to play?
There is some great research and products being created to make it easier for coaches to determine if a player has sustained a blow that is strong enough to cause a concussion.
A company out of Canada called Safebrain Systems has developed a system that works by attaching a sensor to a hockey player helmet. When a player sustains a hit the sensor in the helmet detects the magnitude of the force and determines if it was strong enough to cause a concussion. If the force was above a certain level, it triggers a light to flash on the back of the helmet to warn the coach that the player needs to be evaluated.
Another company Bite Tech has taken a different approach at detecting concussions. Bite Tech has created a mouth piece that an athlete wears. The mouth piece contains several sensors that sends information to a computer on the sideline and allows the coaching staff to monitor the different impacts a player may receive. This technology is already being used by several college football teams like Stanford and Notre Dame
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As this technology evolves, we need to push to make it part of the standard equipment for our children's recreation leagues. Way too often we allow children to continue to play without really knowing the true dangers.
Posted: 12/23/2011 1:45:45 PM by
Dan Galgozy | with 0 comments
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