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Kitchener-Waterloo

New concussion blood test claims 90 per cent accuracy

Medical researchers in London, Ont. say they've discovered a way to accurately identify whether someone's had a concussion by testing a single drop of human blood.

London doctor says concussion blood test represents 'Holy Grail' of brain injury research

Concussions are difficult to diagnose and the ability to detect them through a single drop of human blood represents the 'Holy Grail' of research when it comes to traumatic brain injury, according to lead researcher Dr. Douglas Fraser. (File Photo)

Medical researchers in London, Ont. say they've discovered a newblood test that has a 90 per cent accuracy rate tocorrectly identify whether someone has had a concussion.

It's kind of been the Holy Grail in traumatic brain injury research- Dr. DouglasFraser, a physician in Pediatric Critical Care Unit at Children's Hospital, London Health Sciences Centre

Until now, medical experts have had to rely on medical imaging technology, which can't always detect signs of a concussion, or a complex list of observable physiological signs that only become apparent through thorough physical testing.

The discoverythat a single drop of human blood can tell scientists whether a concussion is presentcould mark a dramatic shift in the way doctors diagnose traumatic brain injury.
Dr. Douglas Fraser and a team of medical researchers have developed a method that can detect a concussion with 90 per cent accuracy by analyzing a single drop of human blood. (Lawson Research)

"For the last 10 years or so it's kind of been the Holy Grail in traumatic brain injury research," said Dr. Douglas Fraser, a physician in Pediatric Critical Care Unit at Children's Hospital, London Health Sciences Centre and the lead researcher on the project.

Chemical fingerprints

The blood test discovered by Dr. Fraser and his colleagues isn't the first to be developed, but it is the first that can detect the presence of a concussion with 90 per cent accuracy.

The blood test focuses on the levels of metabolites in the blood, a waste product generated by the body, that acts asa set of chemical fingerprints.

"By measuring all of these things it gives you a very good idea of what's going on in the body at any given time, including an injury," Fraser said.

Until now, doctors only ever looked at one or two molecules at a time, which wasn't very accurate. So Dr. Frasersaid he and his team took a different approach.
Dr. Fraser hopes his discovery can one day be commercialized into a portable machine that can be used to diagnose head injuries in sports, medical or even military settings. (Fred Vuich/The Associated Press)

90 per cent accuracy

"We were very pleasantly surprised to find out that the pattern of change for 174 metabolites was really quite dramatic after an injury," he said.

"It got to be quite easy to separatewho had had an injury and who had not based on those patterns."

So easy in fact, Dr. Fraser said he and his team coulddetermine the presence of a concussion with startlingaccuracy that ranged from 95 per cent at its highest to 90 per cent at its lowest, far beyond what's considered acceptable in the medical community.

"We tend to say if it's 70 per cent accurate it's a pretty good test," hesaid.
Until now medical experts have had to rely on either a series of observable physiological signs to detect a traumatic brain injury, or medical imaging, which often can't detect concussions. (CBC)

Commercial interest

"Given how robust our results are, there's a lot of commercial interest," Dr. Fraser said, noting the technology is only in its infancy and still involves a cumbersome laboratory setting in order to get a proper diagnosis.

However, he hopes with some refinement and automation of the testing process, the test could be done outside the laboratory with a machine that would be small and light enough to take anywhere.

"This is something with today's technology would be the size of a toaster and could sit on a bench somewhere. This is something that could be in an emergency room, in an athletic locker, it could be on the front lines of a military conflict."

Right now the cost of the test is about $100, but in time, the cost could get as low as $40, which would put it in the same price range as most other blood tests.

That way, Dr. Fraser said concussions won't be so evasive for medical experts trying to diagnosethem, predicttheir severity and even trying to plot a patient's recovery.

"To have a test that's readily available and accurate can certainly help guide outcomes."