Face-to-face evaluation, teleconcussion services in 100% agreement

Telemedicine is able to provide point-of-service care in medical emergencies. A recent study, published in Neurology, found telemedical concussion services and face-to-face evaluations agreed on diagnoses 100 percent of the time.

With many concussions occurring during athletic events, researchers tested the teleconcussion services on the sideline of college football games. Researchers tested each individual with the Standardized Assessment of Concussion (SAC), King-Devick test (K-D) and modified Balance Error Scoring System (mBESS) on 11 male college football athletes with suspected of having a concussion. Each assessment was done by a remote neurologist using two-way telemedicine while a sideline provider performed face-to-face evaluations.

Results found that both face-to-face evaluations and teleconcussion services agreed 100 percent of the time in diagnosing an athlete’s concussion.

"The aim of this study was to investigate the feasibility of teleconcussion for sideline concussion assessments," concluded Bert B. Vargas, MD, first author on the study, neurology researcher at Dallas-based University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and colleagues. “These data suggest a high level of agreement between remote and face-to-face providers with regard to examination findings and [remove-from-play] determinations."