Traumatic Brain Injury – Impact Testing

Transcript

Most young athletes who have been injured playing a sport and sustained either concussion or a mild traumatic brain injury are familiar with the term impact testing. It is a computerized test that was developed by our experts at the University of Pittsburgh medical center. And impact stands for immediate post-concussive assessment and cognitive testing, kind of a long phrase there, but basically what this 20 minute test does is sees how quickly you can process information, how quickly you can react to information, while your visual memory is, your verbal memory, definitely is something that you get a baseline when you begin practice in the spring, summer, fall, whenever at the beginning of your season is, and then if you sustain an injury, you are tested after that. And then it compares the two to see if there’s any decrease in your ability to process information or react. This test is also being used in some of our young military members and veterans, and it’s a very good computerized test, 20 minutes. And some are those of you who kind of try to cheat the system a bit? No, do not act slower at the beginning of your season, just so that you will not be taken out of the game later on. If you sustained a concussion, okay. It is an important test and use it to the best of your ability.