Journal Article

Comment on \Frequency and Magnitude of Game-Related Head Impacts in Male Contact Sports Athletes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis\/Reply

Mitra, Biswadev, Brennan, James H, Nguyen, Jack V, Willmott, Catherine, Fanton, Michael, Wu, Lyndia, Camarillo, David

2020

Overview

We read the recent meta-analysis [1] on the frequency and magnitude of in vivo head impacts in contact sports with great interest, as there is a lack of multi-sport head impact exposure comparisons in the literature. This is in large part due to the wide variance in methodologies used to collect head kinematics data and differentiate true head impacts from false impacts. These inconsistencies greatly limit the comparisons that can be made across sports and even across studies within the same sport. In their review [1], the authors compared the impact exposure for contact sports athletes in 21 different studies of various sports. The cited studies used a variety of sensor systems for measuring head kinematics. Sensor devices were installed within the helmet, on skinmounted patches, or in players' mouthguard with a simple 10-15 g threshold used to record an acceleration event (AE). However, methods for distinguishing real head impacts from false positive AEs varied widely between studies; for example, only a third of the studies used video verification of impacts, while many considered all AEs over the 10-15 g threshold to be true impacts. This major limitation calls into question the key findings of this review and sheds light on a major issue plaguing this field of research.

• Publisher: Springer Nature B.V
• Subject: Accelerometers / Algorithms / Australian football / Funding / Head / Kinematics / Laboratories / Meta-analysis / Reviews / Sensors / Systematic review