An abundance of studies pointing the way to digital health opportunity. A surprise on the early morning radio news in NYC was mention of a report on a blood biomarker that could confirm a diagnosis of concussion, published in the Journal of Neurotrauma. Once found, it wasn’t exactly as advertised but the research is worth reviewing. First, it applies to mild TBI. The biomarker is the extensively studied glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) versus another biomarker, S100β. The key finding by the central Florida-based team is that in a general trauma population, GFAP out-performed S100β in detecting intracranial lesions as diagnosed in CT scans. Scrolling down in the article is a link to the abstract of a meta-study of 11 biomarkers in concussion, by the same lead researcher and another team. The current featured articles in Neurotrauma are a stunning review of studies around concussion and TBI, including two very interesting articles on why air evacuation can do more harm than good (unless absolutely necessary) for TBI patients (altitude lowers oxygen levels) and how mild TBI suffered by retired NFL players has long-term negative metabolic and pituitary effects. All paywalled unless you have library access or a friend with subscription access; however some of the citation articles are open access. But for health tech developers looking for problems to solve better, cheaper and faster, here it is–a lot more promising than yet another me-too wearable.
Concussion diagnostics a hot area
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Cerora-Simon.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]Diagnosing concussive and sub-concussive head blows both in sports and on the battlefield have been challenging, and your Editors have chronicled several approaches. One of the 2014 graduates of NYCEDC’s ELabNYC was Oculogica; their EyeBox CNS records three key eye movements in a 4 1/2 minute test to determine whether they fit a normal box pattern, with subsequent exams determining rate of brain recovery [TTA 17 Apr]. (We’ll be seeing more of Oculogica at NYC MedTech 13 May, along with MC10 which helped to develop the Checklight impact indicating skullcap with Reebok, seen at last November’s CES preview [TTA 15 Nov 13] and winning CES’ 2014 Design & Engineering award.) Now out of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania is Cerora’s MindReader, developed out of Lehigh University, Ben Franklin Technology Partners of NE Pennsylvania and in the first StartUp Health Academy/GE Entrepreneurship class. It is a wireless dry contact EEG reader which combined with other biosensor data and clinical observation aids speedy diagnosis. The reader is worn either on Google Glass or a headset (pictured above left on CEO Adam J. Simon, PhD). It’s in early days and still in testing; the baselines alone will need data from at minimum tens of thousands of subjects beyond the current testing on Lehigh U. athletes. Dr. Simon is also projecting use for sub-concussion injury, Alzheimer’s, PTSD and other neuropsychiatric disorders. Lehigh Valley Live, release on presentation at the American Academy of Neurology Annual meeting 30 April, WFMZ Ch. 69 News (video)
Concussion monitoring in test in NY high school (US)
Following our coverage of CTE and mTBI (mild traumatic brain injury) at the GCRI presentation last week, a small-town football team is one of the first to pilot, albeit for three days, a new concussion detection technology developed by i1Biometrics. The Middletown, NY high school tested their Impact Sensing Mouth Guard that measures hits to better assess the likelihood of cumulative blows and outright head injuries. The mouth guards recognize cheek tissue for activation, and function as a standard mouth guard plus accelerometer and gyroscope to detect the hard-to-determine rotational acceleration. Data is then transmitted wirelessly to a monitoring station (laptop) where trainers can analyze the data. The i1Biometrics system will be further tested this fall at Purdue and the University of South Carolina. Article (Times Herald Record); i1 Biometrics website.
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