Baseline establishment using Virtual Environment Traumatic Brain Injury Screen (VETS)

Abstract

The Virtual Environment Traumatic Brain Injury Screen (VETS) prototype was designed to enable the assessment of mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). This research aims to establish baseline data for balance as an indicator for mTBI and determine reliability of the VETS device. Objectives of this research were to examine the within-session and between-day performance of four balance-based indictors of mTBI with a healthy military population. Fifteen healthy individuals participated in two sessions, separated by a week, where they were tested under six conditions for three trials each. Balance data were recorded by the VETS system using aWii Balance Board with participants in a quiet stance. In-session performance was examined using a paired-samples t-test. A repeated-measures ANOVA was used to individually examine differences between trials across both sessions. A final repeated-measures ANOVA was used to explore all trials across both sessions. Results revealed that the participant performance remained constant or improved across trials and sessions suggesting that a practice effect may have occurred in some conditions. These results suggest that the VETS device reliably measures balance as an indicator of mTBI. Further, these results establish a baseline data set, which may be useful in comparing concussed individuals.