Citation

Campolettano ET, Gellner RA, Sproule DW, Begonia MT, Rowson S. Ann. Biomed. Eng. 2020; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Affiliation

Department of Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10439-020-02505-0

PMID

32266597

Abstract

Youth football helmet testing standards have served to largely eliminate catastrophic head injury from the sport. These standards, though, do not presently consider concussion and do not offer consumers the capacity to differentiate the impact performance of youth American football helmets. This study adapted the previously developed Summation of Tests for the Analysis of Risk (STAR) equation for youth football helmet assessment. This adaptation made use of a youth-specific testing surrogate, on-field data collected from youth football players, and a concussion risk function developed for youth athletes. Each helmet is subjected to 48 laboratory impacts across 12 impact conditions. Peak linear head acceleration and peak rotational head acceleration values from each laboratory impact are aggregated into a single STAR value that combines player exposure and risk of concussion. This single value can provide consumers with valuable information regarding the relative performance of youth football helmets.

Language: en

Keywords

Biomechanics; Concussion; Impact; Injury risk