Tackling health care dilemmas
Pediatric neurosurgeon Samuel Browd, MD-PhD '00, uses entrepreneurial drive to develop football helmet
amuel Browd, MD-PhD ’00, has never been one to sit on the sidelines and watch.
As a pediatric neurosurgeon, clinic visits and surgery aren’t the only ways Browd is forging better health care for his patients and the larger community. Browd, a professor of pediatric neurological surgery at the University of Washington and medical director of the Seattle Sports Concussion Program at Seattle Children’s Hospital, is the co-founder of four companies aimed at solving health care dilemmas and developing innovative treatment options for neurologic conditions.
Browd, a 2000 graduate of the UF College of Medicine’s MD-PhD Training Program, shared stories of his entrepreneurial experience during the 2017 UF College of Medicine Alumni Weekend.
During a TED-like talk on Sept. 15, Browd featured his company, VICIS Inc., an innovator in the sports helmet industry and winner of the Head Health Challenge 2 grant, sponsored by the NFL, Under Armour and General Electric. He shared how the company, led by a physician and an engineer, has developed safer options for playing football that help prevent traumatic brain injuries.
The football helmet hasn’t changed much in the past 70 years, Browd explained, and new research was aimed at confirming diagnosis rather than focusing on prevention.
“A lot of energy was spent around sensors and detecting concussion after it happened, and we wanted to know if there’s a way to prevent concussion on the field,” Browd said.
VICIS Inc., a company started at the University of Washington, produces a helmet unlike any the sports industry has seen. Browd and his co-founders envisioned a helmet that not only provided safer protection against concussions, but one that was at the peak of technological innovation and supported by the athletes who would wear it.
The VICIS ZERO1 helmet made its debut this fall across college and professional football. The helmet was in the hands of 30 NCAA football teams and 25 NFL teams during spring and summer practices and is an option for players during the regular season.
Browd is confident players will choose the physician and engineer-designed helmet over others.
“If you’re able to innovate in health care, you can have a very big impact,” Browd said. “If we come close to what we think we can with the helmet, it’s going to make sports safer for athletes across the board — in any helmeted sport. The technology is available, and we think we have it.”
This story originally ran in the Fall 2017 issue of the Doctor Gator newsletter.
