For well over a decade now, the focus around football has been rule changes and technology to make the game as safe as it has ever been regarding concussions and head injuries as new rules and products are brought to the market on an annual basis.
However, one area of concern - stretching far outside of football - has gone largely unchanged.
That area relates to how we all manage practices while our outdoor environments are unrelenting in regards to heat, leading coaches and trainers checking heat indexes in various ways outlined by our respective states, sparking heat advisories or heat-related illnesses, and in the most unfortunate cases - heat-related deaths.
Just last week we wrote about a JV football player in north Texas who suffered a medical emergency at practice earlier in the week.
By all accounts, the incident was treated with the same protocols we're all trained to use, with practice accommodations being made due to a heat advisory, athletic trainers immediately stepping in to begin treatment, getting the player in a cold tub to quickly reduce his body temperature. Finally, after showing signs of improvement, he was taken to the hospital.
Two days later, the student tragically passed away.
A new product hitting the market is hoping to save lives in similar situations with a product that can intervene much earlier.
While current guidelines measure the weather, the fact is two players can respond to that same weather in very different ways.
Enter HeatSense, a product being launched by a mom of three youth athletes in Texas, who reached out directly to FootballScoop recently to share their new product launch. HeatSense pairs a "non-invasive wearable," located on a student athlete's chest or bicep, with an athlete app, or Team Dashboard to show how each individual athlete is responding to the heat in real time.
The information gathered via Bluetooth from the wearable is meant to provide critical individualized information to allow coaches to "practice, push, and cool down based on individual athletes, not just the weather."
Instead of relying on weather-only metrics, the wearable measures each wearer's core body temperature, skin temperature and heart rate while also displaying the Texas-preferred Wet Bulb Globe (WBGT) alongside the player's biometrics.
To be clear, there are other wearables on the market to help measure athlete performance, heart rate, load management, and are combined with GPS and analytics, but HeatSense's focus on how athletes react to their heat and environment appears to a leader in that respect.
The athlete app is available now, with a Team Edition of the dashboard currently being developed as well to allow coaches full roster view of their team working out in real time.
The founder of HeatSense is Melissa Fortenberry, who brings 25-years in consumer tech with companies like Expedia, RVShare and Phillips Electronics to her new venture.
“Today’s decisions are based on weather guidelines that treat everyone the same. HeatSense shifts the focus to the athlete, giving simple insights so coaches know when to push, when to rest, and how to keep performance from dropping.”
According to their website, the HeatSense kit runs about $400, with each Thermal Sensor, complete with strap and charging case, priced at $300.
