Red alert: Rugby to use mouthguards that flash after heavy impacts
The initiative from World Rugby is a progression of technology that was first brought to matches in 2021 and has been steadily developed since. LED mouthguards were trialled successfully in Major League Rugby and in the Under-20 World Championship this year, receiving the green light to be rolled out further.
Referees will be asked to immediately stop the match upon seeing these clear mouthguards turn red as soon as a player experiences a certain level of force in a collision. An alert will still be sent to a match-day doctor via Bluetooth to warn of a possible concussion, but the hope is that another further visual cue enhances awareness.
Typically, at the moment, a player will be brought off upon a natural break in play after their mouthguard has been triggered. It is hoped that the flashing LED will both save time and reduce doubt as to which collision caused the head impact.
'Everybody will be able to tell when a player has sustained a big head impact,' said Dr Lindsay Starling, the science and medical manager for World Rugby.
'It will create awareness in the stands and for fans at home, as well as for the players and officials. It should mean that there is absolutely no delay in a player being pulled off for a HIA [head injury assessment]. Ultimately, this just helps to tell the story.'
The English Premiership and the United Rugby Championship will be among the competitions to follow the 2025 World Cup in showcasing the LED mouthguards, which have been developed by Prevent Biometrics and are installed with an accelerometer and a gyroscope to measure linear and rotational force.
After years of gathering data, scientists have set the threshold for an alert at 75Gs (g-force) for men and 65Gs, or 4,500 radians (measuring how fast something is rotating) per second, for either gender. These are categorised as the 99th percentile of collisions.
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