South Sydney District Junior Rugby Football League is aiming to test up to 3000 young rugby league players with virtual reality eye-tracking technology to more accurately diagnose concussion injuries sustained on the field.
The Australian-owned technology, called NeuroFlex, uses VR goggles to examine a player’s cognitive function through a range of eye-tracking and head movement tests in less than 10 minutes. A connected laptop produces data to help inform whether a player is ready to return to the field or needs more time to recuperate.
Hayden Gregory, 10, who plays for the South Eastern Seagulls with Stephen Fenech (right) and David Stevens, head of NeuroFlex.Credit:Nick Moir
Associate Professor James McLoughlin, a neurological physiotherapist at Flinders University, said the test more accurately assesses the severity of a concussion diagnosis that can rely, in part, on self-reported symptoms.
“A lot of our assessments are based on people’s subjective symptoms like their headache, dizziness, nausea and feeling foggy,” he said.
“This technology gives us objective, measurable data that we never had before. It’s as if you’re testing co-ordination in a limb, you can see whether they’re overshooting or undershooting or if they’re struggling with their co-ordination.”
The technology can help decide whether a player stays out of play longer and it can also get sidelined players back on the field earlier by tracking the speed of their recovery.
How NeuroFlex’s technology is used to test for concussion.
“One of the worst things you can do for concussion is to continue playing on the day or come back too early when your brain hasn’t recovered,” McLoughlin said.
The league intends to conduct baseline testing of its junior players older than 12 this season. It will keep cognitive data so as to compare results after a youngster suffers a head knock. Baseline testing is optional for players under 12.
Melissa Dowd’s son Hayden Gregory, 10, plays for the South Eastern Seagulls and daughter Kailee Gregory, 13, for the La Perouse Panthers. Dowd said the testing gave her peace of mind after a player in one of her son’s games last year suffered a concussion. She said using the technology was preferable to a proposed blanket ban on tackling for kids under 12 that was opposed by the association.
“You’re not sending them back out too early. And you could have a kid that doesn’t take as long [to recover] and then they’re not missing out on their grand final. It’s taking the guessing game out of it,” she said.
Mario Fenech, right, at South Sydney training in September last year.Credit:Getty
Former Rabbitohs player turned technology journalist Stephen Fenech said a system such as NeuroFlex could have changed the outcome for his brother, South Sydney legend Mario Fenech, who developed early onset dementia.
“As a result of his continued head knocks his short-term memory is now pretty much gone. He can still remember everybody’s name, it isn’t that bad,” Fenech said. “But he can’t remember where he parked his car, he’ll ask me a couple of times how my family is in the same conversation.”
Fenech believes the technology, which has been trialled in Super Rugby and the 2022 FIFA World Cup, should be taken up by the NRL and other contact sports.
“Rather than change the rules of the game, let’s be proactive and get everyone’s baseline and test them on those rare occasions when you get a head injury,” he said.
McLoughlin said more data was needed to understand how contact sport is connected to cognitive conditions such as dementia, but there’s “obviously a link between multiple head knocks and increased risk of those conditions later on”.
“I don’t want there to be an overreaction. For example, there’s the school in Sydney where the girls are banned from playing AFL. Some of those decisions are probably overreaching at the moment because we don’t have enough information,” he said.
“If you look at the benefits of playing sport for your general health and engagement in the community, it could far outweigh any risks for problems later on.”
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