LONDON, March 24 (Xinhua) -- A simple saliva test that can in minutes diagnose concussion in football players was described Wednesday as a gamechanger in sports.
A team of experts from Britain's University of Birmingham studied swab tests from over 1,000 top-flight rugby players and identified a new way of accurately diagnosing concussion using saliva. It paves the way for the first non-invasive clinical test for concussion for use in sport and other settings.
"It shows specific salivary biomarkers can be used to indicate if a player has been concussed," said a spokesman at the university.
The university's Dr Valentina Di Pietro said: "A non-invasive and accurate diagnostic test using saliva is a real game changer and may provide an invaluable tool to help clinicians diagnose concussions more consistently and accurately.
"Concussion can be difficult to diagnose, particularly in settings such as grass roots sports where evaluation by a specialist clinician is not possible. Consequently, some concussions may go undiagnosed. There are also concerns regarding the long-term brain health of those exposed to repeated concussions."
Di Pietro said the diagnostic tool may be used in professional sports in addition to current head injury assessment protocols to ensure the safety of individual sports players.
Senior author of the study, professor Antonio Belli from the Trauma Neurosurgery at the University of Birmingham and a consultant neurosurgeon at University Hospitals Birmingham (UHB) said: "The ability to rapidly diagnose concussion using biomarkers in addition to existing tools solves a major unmet need in the sporting world as well as in military and healthcare settings, particularly in injuries without significant visible symptoms.
"Crucially, the differences in the salivary concentration of these biomarkers are measurable within minutes of injury, which means we can make rapid diagnoses."
A spokesman at the university said: "The scientific breakthrough provides a new laboratory-based non-invasive salivary biological concussion test, which could have wide-reaching use and potential to reduce the risk of missing concussions not only in sport -- from grassroots to professional levels -- but also in wider settings such as military and healthcare."
The Birmingham-led research was carried out in collaboration with the Rugby Football Union (RFU), Premiership Rugby.
The academic team will present their findings and planned next research steps at the World Rugby Laws and Welfare Symposium to be held later this month.
The study was carried out in collaboration with the Universities of Bath and Cambridge, and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Enditem
