The Canberra Raiders' role in the war on concussion

The Green Machine took part in a technology trial that could help identify not only which NRL players could be most at risk of concussion, but also what positions or even training drills could be most at risk as well.

That data could be extremely useful with concussion one of the hottest topics in elite sport.

The NRL announced on Wednesday a mandatory 11-day stand-down period for concussed players, just days after Newcastle star Kalyn Ponga suffered his fourth concussion in 10 months.

Canberra wore HITIQ smart mouthguards for two seasons as part of a trial across several NRL clubs.

It measures the number impacts, as well as the severity of them - not only linearly, but rotationally as well.

HITIQ chief operating officer Tom Laudenbach, who lives in Canberra, said they wanted to build a databank that tracked entire careers.

The AFL signed a new deal to continue using their mouthguards last year.

They're in discussions with the NRL about the potential for a similar rollout with them.

"It's really important to note we're not a diagnostic device - our mouthguard does not diagnose concussion in any way," Laudenbach told The Canberra Times.

"It's a surveillance tool ... the data that comes from those mouthguards act as an alert system fundamentally.

"We pull detailed data around the number of head impacts sustained by an athlete, as well as the magnitude of those impacts - both linear and rotational acceleration.

"That allows us to spotlight any athletes we think maybe at risk - that need to be checked on by the doctor.

"But we can do a whole bunch of analysis across which training drills are eliciting a greater number of impacts, or a higher magnitude of head impacts, certain positional groups that are seeing greater head-impact load.

"Certain players that we're worried about - potentially there's some technique changes that could be made there.

"Sporting bodies have the opportunity to manipulate rules or regulations around pre-season based on the data that we're collecting."

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With the long-term effects of concussion a massive concern, Laudenbach said they were looking to build a long-term database mapped entire careers.

They currently have about three to four years of data at the elite level.

Those long-term effects have been thrown into the spotlight with two class actions launched against the AFL this week.

"The piece the AFL are really running hard on is using the technology to build a long-term databank," Laudenbach said.

"There's the end of a match where you can look at what kind of impact loads these players are taking on, but then what does it look like over the course of a season and over the course of a career.

"If we retrospectively look at one player, whatever sport it might be, in whatever position it might, for the last 10 years, what does that longitudinal impact profile look like?

"Because there's all this talk about potential deleterious health outcomes due to playing certain sports, but really there's no way to ascertain whether there is any true correlation between playing those sports and any health outcome without actually measuring what's happening when they're playing these sports."

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