Harvard students invent $300 headset that could change how youth concussions are spotted

Three Harvard graduate students just won an international award for inventing a device that helps screen for concussions in under two minutes. Their goal? Find a cost-effective way to help youth sports coaches make the right decision about a young player's health. On the professional level athletes have all the top medical care at their fingertips but it's a much different playing field when it comes to youth sports. We see two to three million sports related concussions in the US per year and the current tools that are out there are not accessible for helping protect those concussions. If an athlete plays for 15 minutes through a concussion, it actually can increase the long-term symptoms by 12 times. These three Harvard Design Engineering students sought to find an easy and affordable way for youth sports coaches to make decisions on the sidelines quickly and objectively. A lot of people's like... College and futures depend on their ability to perform, so this allows a coach and an athlete to make an objective decision that, hey, maybe you're at risk, we should take you out so that we can make sure that you get in front of a medical professional. The students created Rumble Rims, an infrared eye-tracking headset to screen for concussions. The 3D-printed gear is outfitted with IR cameras. It only costs about $300 to make and provides step-by-step instructions for both the player and the coach. Then we are going to click start the test. While wearing the headset, the athlete plays a two-minute ocular game. They're basically tracking a dot across the screen, and the whole time the camera is collecting data on how quick they are, how steady they are, all these variables that change when somebody's experienced a concussion or any kind of neurological damage. While the player completes the test, the coach is able to monitor the results on a separate screen. It in no way is a diagnosis at this point, but it is meant to give Some kind of sense to the coach, whether they should really let this player go back on the field or send them to a doctor for further treatment and diagnosis. The students spoke to several coaches, players, and trainers about how this could help them make difficult decisions. A lot of people are not really honest about their symptoms. And we really wanted to find something that maybe exists in the labs that we could probably bring to the sidelines that could give very clear signs of what it is and what it's not. The students say this helps take the guesswork and emotional part out of the coach's game-time decision. They would love something that takes that pressure off of them and really allows them to make a decision that feels right in the moment and kind of can't be argued with. And these students believe brain health can't be argued with, especially at such a young age. I think if this was on every sideline in every high school, we would be able to keep those kids safer throughout their whole life. careers, whether they go on to play sports in college and beyond. Now, right now, the headset is a prototype, but the students are looking at doing clinical trials and pilot programs with schools. The goal is to have it available on the sidelines all over the U.S. and world to protect young athletes.