The ten winning companies with the BEST new sports medicine technologies for 2018 are: Arthrex, Carestream Health, Include Health Inc., iTrace Biomedical Inc., KATOR LLC, MTF Biologics in conjunction with Missouri Orthopedic Institute & ConMed, PolyPhysics, Inc., Quadrant Biosciences, Stryker. Stryker had two winning technologies.
Rewarding Innovation and Perspiration
This annual award rewards inventors, engineering teams, physicians and their companies who’ve created the most innovative, enduring and practical products in 2018 to treat injured athletes in ANY activity—whether sports, industry, military or healthcare. To win the Orthopedics This Week Best New Technology Award for sports medicine care, a new technology must meet the following criteria:
- Be creative and innovative.
- Have long term significance to the problem of treating the injured athlete. Does this technology have staying power?
- Solve a clinical problem. To what extent does this technology solve a current clinical problem or problem that is inadequately solved today?
- Does it have the potential to improve standard of care?
- Is it cost effective?
- I would use it.
Here, then are the ten best new sports medicine technologies for 2018 arranged in alphabetical order:
Winning Technology: Carestream Onsight 3D Extremity System
Carestream Health
Inventors: William Snyder, John Yorkston, Dave Foos, Robert Asento, Anthony DiRisio, Joseph Newman, Michael Litzenberger, Douglas Csaszar, Andrew Hartmann.
Engineers: William Snyder, John Yorkston, Dave Foos, Robert Asento, Anthony DiRisio, Joseph Newman, Michael Litzenberger, Douglas Csaszar, Andrew Hartmann, Adam Pruyne Poetker, Rod Wagner, Mike Kensek, Steve Lamy, Doug Bailey, Alex Mathew, Dave Laurie Cesar, Weidong Huang.
Lower radiation, affordable and extreme flexibility. These were the attributes that led judges to rate Carestream OnSight 3D Extremity System so highly.
FDA approved, the system relies on cone beam CT (CBCT) technology to capture weight bearing and other types of patient extremity images. It delivers high-quality, low-dose 3D imaging for orthopedic and sports medicine practices, hospitals, imaging centers, urgent care facilities and other healthcare providers.
Did we mention affordability with less radiation than traditional CT systems while still delivering excellent image quality?
The system is designed to work in a variety of clinical settings and orthopedic conditions including feet, ankles and other joints, including arthritis, meniscus loss and instability. And because the system is compact and easy to use it can be set up at a doctor’s office so patients don’t need to make an extra trip to the hospital for imaging tests. By allowing the imaging and patient consultation to take place in one visit, the Carestream Onsight D Extremity System improves productivity of the orthopedic specialists and provides convenience for patients.
But wait, there’s more. The large-area detector that can capture a 3D image of the patient in a single rotation and takes only 25 seconds. It plugs into a standard wall outlet. Finally, the patient’s head and body are not confined so no claustrophobia.
Winning Technology: ClearEdge Brain Health Toolkit
Quadrant Biosciences Inc.
Quadrant BioScience has developed a way to monitor brain health after a concussion through functional assessment!
The system, called ClearEdge Brain Health Toolkit, was developed in cooperation with researchers and clinicians at SUNY Upstate Medical.
The toolkit is a collection of FDA-cleared and listed functional assessment tools to track subtle changes in cognitive function, balance and patient symptoms that can occur over time after a concussion. Similar to heart and kidney function tests, the ClearEdge Brain Health Toolkit uses functional markers to monitor brain health long term and help determine the effectiveness of different therapies.
Quadrant Biosciences has partnered with the Hall of Fame (HOF) Players Foundation to monitor the brain health of retired National Football League athletes using the toolkit. As part of continued concussion research, the company is also collecting saliva samples to monitor for epigenetic biomarkers.
Testing began in April 2018 with new participants being added in August.
