Ganly Mark, McMahon Jill Mary
Contego Sports Ltd., Unit 1 Oranmore Business park, Oranmore, Co., Galway, Ireland.
Galway Neuroscience Group, National University of Ireland Galway, Galway, Ireland.
BMJ Open Sport Exerc Med. 2018 Dec 7;4(1):e000464. doi: 10.1136/bmjsem-2018-000464. eCollection 2018.
In the aim to develop a usable and wearable head guard for rugby that could reduce impact energy and lessen the likelihood of concussive and subconcussive injury during play, a combination of viscoelastic materials was employed to develop a guard with similar dimensions to those currently used in international rugby.
The head guard was tested for impact energy reduction following linear acceleration, using drop tests, as required by World Rugby. The head guard was also subjected to pendulum tests, allowing acceleration to be simultaneously measured on two headforms, as well as repeated impacts to mimic ageing and repeated use. Impact following rotational acceleration was determined at two impact locations and at three impact velocities.
The viscoelastic head guard (N-Pro) was shown to reduce linear impacts by up to 75% in comparison to the use of a commercially available rugby head guard and repeated impacts did not impair the attenuation of impact energy. Rotational impact energy was also reduced by an average of 34% across three speeds and two sites of impact test sites, in comparison to tested bare headforms.
This heralds a new generation of soft-shelled headgear that could help reduce two primary risk factors in sports-induced mild traumatic brain injury: linear and rotational impacts to the head.
为了开发一种适用于橄榄球运动的可使用且可穿戴的头部防护装备，以降低撞击能量，并减少比赛期间脑震荡和亚脑震荡损伤的可能性，采用了粘弹性材料的组合来开发一种尺寸与国际橄榄球目前使用的装备相似的防护装备。
按照世界橄榄球联合会的要求，通过跌落测试对头部防护装备在直线加速后的撞击能量降低情况进行测试。该头部防护装备还进行了摆锤测试，可同时在两个头模上测量加速度，以及进行重复撞击以模拟老化和重复使用情况。在两个撞击位置和三种撞击速度下测定旋转加速后的撞击情况。
与使用市售橄榄球头部防护装备相比，粘弹性头部防护装备（N-Pro）可将直线撞击减少多达75%，且重复撞击不会削弱撞击能量的衰减。与测试的裸头模相比，在三种速度和两个撞击测试部位，旋转撞击能量平均也降低了34%。
这预示着新一代软壳头盔的诞生，它有助于降低运动性轻度创伤性脑损伤中的两个主要风险因素：头部的直线和旋转撞击。
