Advancing Concussion Assessment in Children (A-CAP)
Advancing Concussion Assessment in Children (A-CAP)
The objective of A-CAP is to improve ability to diagnose pediatric concussion and make prognostic predictions about outcomes. A-CAP is a multi-site, prospective cohort study that is assessing a broad pool of neurobiological and psychosocial markers, including some not yet studied in any large-scale study (e.g., genes; psychological resilience; multi-model magnetic resonance imaging), and assess outcomes over 6 months post-injury. Recruitment for the study occurs when children present to the Emergency Department at five sites across Canada: Alberta Children’s Hospital (Calgary), Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (Ottawa), Ste-Justine Hospital (Montreal), Stollery Children’s Hospital (Edmonton), and BC Children’s Hospital (Vancouver). All sites are members of the Pediatric Emergency Research Canada (PERC) network. Injury information is collected in the emergency department. A range of neurobiological and psychosocial markers, potential confounders, and outcomes (i.e., post-concussive symptoms, functional disability, quality of life) are assessed at follow-up visits within 10 days post-injury and at 3 and 6 months post-injury. Weekly symptoms ratings also are obtained remotely via smartphones or the Internet. The study will have a large sample (700 mTBI, 300 mild orthopaedic injuries) to enable the analysis of complex interactions among diagnostic and prognostic markers. We hypothesize that this strategy will (1) identify mTBI with excellent sensitivity and specificity (i.e., differentiate it from orthopaedic injury) and (2) predict longitudinal outcomes of mTBI.
Funding
Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)
Co-Investigators
- Nishard Abdeen
- Karen Barlow
- Miriam Beauchamp
- Christian Beaulieu
- Bruce Bjornson
- Brian Brooks
- William Craig
- Quynh Doan
- Sylvain Deschenes
- Carolyn Emery
- Stephen Freedman
- Bradley Goodyear
- Jocelyn Gravel
- Kristina Kowalski
- Ryan Lamont
- Catherine Lebel
- Angelo Mikrogianakis
- Kelly Mrklas
- Kathryn Schneider
- Lianne Tomfohr
- Roger Zemek
Participating Centers
- University of Calgary/Alberta Children’s Hospital (Calgary, AB)
- University of Ottawa/Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontatrio (CHEO) (Ottawa, ON)
- University of Montreal/Ste-Justine Hopsital (Montreal, QB)
- University of Alberta/ Stollery Children’s Hospital (Edmonton, AB)
- University of British Columbia/BC Children’s Hospital (Vancouver, BC)