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>> About two and a half million kids every year sustain concussions.
And we think that probably it's an underestimate.
>> About 20% of teenagers have had at least one concussion.
Only about two-thirds of those concussions are due to sports.
I'm Kristy Arbogast.
I'm a biomechanical engineer and I am co-lead of the Minds Matter Concussion Program.
>> And I'm Tina Master.
I'm a pediatric sports medicine specialist and I'm the other co-lead of the Minds Matter Concussion Program.
We like to think of it as a comprehensive program where we are trying to do our very best to diagnose, treat, but
also advance our understanding of how to better diagnose and treat children with a concussion through research.
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>> I think you're seeing a culture and an environment where a teammate is looking out
for their teammate, if they see they've had a big hit.
And making sure that they are getting medical attention.
The sooner you get to medical attention, the better your outcomes are.
Another very important issue that we have been focused on is trying to understand repetitive head impacts.
We've started a research program, studying soccer heading in adolescents.
And we're trying to understand how a series of soccer headers affects the function of their brain.
We think we have an opportunity to understand how to reduce the number of times a child may impact their head
or the severity that they may impact their head with.
So one of the ways we're learning about the biomechanics or the engineering of concussion
is through instrumented mouth guards.
So these are regular mouth guards, but in it is embedded electronics.
And what that electronics tells us is how fast their head is moving, and in what direction.
That allows us to understand what might be going on in the brain.
We can use computer models to look inside the brain, to tell us if the head moves in this way, the neurons of the
brain stretch, the blood vessels of the brain stretch, in this particular way that might end up causing damage.
This technology is very similar to what's being implemented right now in the NFL.
I serve as a consultant for the NFL and the NFL Players Association to help them understand the scenarios in
which concussions happen in professional football.
Two and a half million kids sustaining a concussion every year -- 30% going on to long-term challenges.
That's a big number and we really have an opportunity to impact a large number of children, large number of families.
>> Concussion can really effect just their general mental well-being.
Anxiety and depression are very real effects of concussion that we have to be aware of.
So another instrument that we're really excited about is the pupillometer.
It is a device that is handheld and portable and potentially could have real relevant clinical utility
on the sideline, in the athletic training room, besides in the office where we are currently examining it.
What the pupillometry does, is it shines a light at your eye, and then it uses an infrared camera
to capture how your pupil responds to that light.
And so you're actually able to get very precise measurements in terms of how quickly your pupil responds to light.
And that seems to be changed after concussion and so we just had a research publication that
came out last year in JAMA Ophthalmology that indicated that this device has a lot of promise.
We're hopefully moving the diagnosis of concussion from, "Hey, how you feeling?
Do you think you have a concussion?"
And reporting symptoms of headache and dizziness and feeling off balance, to hopefully objective measures
that we'll be able to use both in diagnosis, as well as monitoring, and then a safe return to play after recovery.
So we're very excited about these technologies.
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A lot of us grew up thinking that when you have a concussion, it's no big deal.
That you'll be better in a few days and there's nothing to really worry about.
There's probably up to a third of kids where they can have really debilitating issues with headache,
dizziness, balance issues, sleep issues, emotional issues, that can last for weeks and sometimes even months.
>> We have the largest concussion patient volume in the country.
And that really enhances our ability to understand this issue very fundamentally.
>> Kids can take up to four weeks or longer to recover
from a concussion and 30% of them can take longer.
If we take an active approach to recovery, they seem to do much better.
We have both sports medicine, doctors, as well as ER doctors, nurse practitioners, and
nurses and athletic trainers who help us.
We also have biomechanical engineers and epidemiologists and statisticians.
And so that makes for a really rich conversation about how we can best move forward concussion care for children.
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The people who are involved and who have the chance to be involved with us, they really understand
the impact of concussion on a child's life.
We've been very successful in getting NIH and CDC and DOD and NCAA funding, but we do find that philanthropy
allows us to ask questions that maybe those traditional funders find a little bit risky, but we're asking
those questions because those the questions that our patients are asking, our families are asking us.
What is great about working with our donors is that our agenda is their agenda.
What they would like to accomplish very much resonates with us and so it's been a huge support to us.
We've been really thankful for it and excited to partner with new partners for the future.
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