VALIDATION OF AN INSTRUMENTED MOUTHGUARD

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to determine the validity of an raw and filtered acceleration time-series data from an instrumented mouthguard system against an anthropometric testing device. Testing was conducted in a laboratory using a standard impact protocol utilising the head-form of reference system and the mouthguard system. Testing occurred at 5 impact locations: facemask, front, oblique, side and back, and at four velocities (3.6, 5.5, 7.4, and 9.3 m/s) to attain a total of 55 impacts. A 160 Hz Low-pass 4 th order Butterworth filter was applied to the time-series data, and was reported as raw and filtered. Peak linear acceleration, peak rotational velocity and peak rotational acceleration was statistically compared to the reference measurement system. Total concordance correlation coefficient was 90.7% and 96.9%, for raw and filtered data set. Raw and filtered had intraclass correlation coefficients of 0.85 and 0.95 for peak linear acceleration, 0.99 and 0.99 for peak rotational velocity and 0.94 and 0.95 peak rotational acceleration respectively. The instrumented mouthguard displayed high accuracy when measuring head impact kinematics in a laboratory setting. The results presented in this study provide the basis on which the instrumented mouthguard can be further developed for deployment and application within sport quantify head impact collision dynamics in order to optimise performance and brain health.