The NFL announced Tuesday a new partnership with the University of Washington (UW) and three other universities to expand on their collection of data regarding on-field head impacts, to increase injury-reduction efforts in football.
“We’re pleased to be part of this collaborative player-safety initiative. I look forward to collecting data that ultimately improves our ability to protect football players from head trauma at all levels – youth, high school, college and professional,” said Dr. Kimberly Harmon, professor of family medicine and orthopedics and sports medicine at the UW School of Medicine.
Football players from the universities of Alabama, North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Wisconsin join UW in not only using custom-fit mouth guards, but using the data collected to inform the schools of their own efforts in the advancement of player health and safety.
The mouth guard sensors, currently in use by 10 NFL teams, collect kinematic data, such as impact speed, direction, force, location and severity.
Data collected will help inform approaches to injury reduction and decrease head impacts overall, which will help improve the safety of the game.