New rapid blood test for concussions gets FDA approval [Video]

A new rapid blood test that can reportedly detect brain injuries like concussions in just minutes has cleared a major hurdle toward becoming widely available for use in the U.S.

Health care company Abbott Laboratories announced that its i-STAT TBI cartridge has been granted approval by the Food and Drug Administration and can now be used by clinicians to evaluate patients with suspected mild traumatic brain injury. Abbott says the test requires a small sample of a patient’s blood to be inserted into the cartridge, and then it produces lab-quality results in just 15 minutes.

According to the National Institutes of Health, approximately 5 million people visit urgent care centers each year with traumatic brain-related injuries. And for decades, the process of detecting head trauma in patients has primarily been based on subjective doctor assessments or required blood samples to be sent off to a lab for processing and testing. 

However, Abbott claims its new rapid blood test …