Pitt Research Team Makes Breakthrough in Diagnosing Concussions

A University of Pittsburgh research team has made a significant breakthrough in the detection of concussions, which could have a lasting impact on youth, college and professional athletics.

According to a report by Abby Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dr. David Okonkwo — director of Pitt’s Neurotrauma Clinical Center and the Pittsburgh Steelers’ team neurosurgeon — has received FDA approval for a device that will be able to detect a concussion quickly and accessibly.

It’s a breakthrough in the detection and treatment of concussions in football, with availability in hospitals and urgent care facilities as early as this summer.

The device is known as i-STAT Alinity, and it’s an advancement of a previous device that Okonkwo developed, the i-STAT TBI, which was the first handheld blood test for concussions. The i-STAT Alinity takes out the middleman (a healthcare professional), and allows a normal sample of blood to suffice for testing — opposed to a previously needed blood “serum.”

“It’s almost like trying to measure something in tap water versus measuring something from a river,” Okonkwo told the Post-Gazette. “There are countless things in a river that aren’t in tap water, by the time it’s processed through numerous steps, goes through a pipe, ends up in your house, comes out of your tap and into a glass that you drink.

“When you go to whole blood, you’re having to test river water instead of tap water.”

The research team, which features Okonkwo and research partner Ava Puccio, is hoping to get the i-STAT Alinity on the sidelines as quickly as possible. But first, there’s a desire to remove the need for a needle-and-syringe blood draw in favor of a glucometer-like finger-stick test.

Mackey further reported that in order for i-STAT Alinity devices to be used on college and professional sidelines, professional sports leagues and players’ unions will need to approve its usage.

Concussions are one of the major issues facing the NFL (and college football, to a lesser extent), and while Okonkwo’s development isn’t a way to combat the dangerous effects of concussions and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), it’s a step in the right direction.

“Concussions are a type of traumatic brain injury (TBI) caused by a direct blow or bump to the head, or by a hit to the body that causes powerful movement of the head or neck, forcing the brain to move rapidly inside of the skull,” Mackey wrote.

“When that occurs, proteins are released into the blood. The detection of two of those — UCH-L1 and GFAP — is how i-STAT Alinity is able to rule out concussion with a 96.5% predictive value, when assessed within 24 hours of injury, per statistics provided by Abbott, which indicates that a CT scan (to rule out a brain bleed) is likely unnecessary.”