Study helps identify risk factors for the potentially deadly condition

Thousands of high school and college athletes in the Tampa Bay area train outdoors in Florida's sweltering heat and high humidity.

Now, a study by doctors at USF Health seeks to arm coaches and athletic trainers with the information they need to prevent life-threatening heat exhaustion and illness. The study uses a small, silicone-coated electronic pill the size of a multivitamin to monitor the core body temperature of USF football players who volunteer as test subjects. The athletes swallow the pills before running on a treadmill and exercising in a medically supervised heat laboratory that replicates the climate players experience during a typical practice day on the football field.

"A major cause of death in athletics is heat illness," said Dr. Eric Coris, a member of USF Health's Sports Medicine & Athletic-Related Trauma Institute. "With this study, we are finding that we can monitor players' core temperature in a practical way to try to keep them out of trouble."

The study is funded by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. The electronic pills used are made by HQ Inc., a Palmetto company that licenses the technology from Johns Hopkins University.