Kavera vs. ImPACT
Kavera and ImPACT both serve concussion care, but they solve different problems: ImPACT is a baseline-versus-post-injury computerized neurocognitive test used mainly for return-to-play decisions, while Kavera is a broader between-visit monitoring platform spanning concussion, mental health, cognitive health, and headache, designed to generate the documentation that supports RTM and neurocognitive testing billing.
The Short Version
ImPACT (impactconcussion.com) is a well-established, FDA-cleared (per ImPACT's own public statements) computerized concussion test built around a single core workflow: establish a baseline before injury, then re-test after injury and compare the two to inform return-to-play and return-to-learn timing. It is widely used in sports medicine, school athletic programs, and team settings, and it operates a formal credentialing program (CIC, ITAT, ITPT) for the people who administer it.
Kavera is built for the ongoing clinical relationship between visits, not a single pre/post comparison. It delivers a assessment battery — symptom scales, mood/anxiety/PTSD screens, sleep measures, and cognitive-domain tests — directly to patients on a recurring basis, and organizes that data into four clinical modules (Concussion, Mental Health, Cognitive Health, Headache) so a practice can track a patient's full recovery picture, not just a single cognitive score, and produce documentation aligned to RTM (98975, 98978, 98980, 98981, 98979) and neurocognitive testing (96116/96121, 96132/96133, 96136/96137, 96138/96139, 96146) codes.
Comparison Table
Where ImPACT Fits
ImPACT's strength is its specificity and its footprint: it is a purpose-built, widely adopted tool for the single moment that matters most in sideline and school-based concussion management — deciding whether a post-injury score has returned to an athlete's own baseline. Its credentialing program (CIC, ITAT, ITPT) gives athletic trainers, school nurses, and team staff a structured, repeatable way to administer the test correctly, and its pricing is transparently published on ImPACT's own site as per-test rates with volume tiers (see impacttest.com/impact-applications-healthcare-pricing). For a sports program or school district whose primary need is a validated baseline/post-injury comparison tool, ImPACT is a mature, purpose-fit option.
Where ImPACT's public materials are less specific is on what happens clinically between the baseline test and the post-injury test, or after a patient is cleared to return to play but is still reporting symptoms weeks later — persistent post-concussive symptoms, sleep disruption, mood changes, or headache. ImPACT's own site content centers on baseline methodology and administrator training rather than on multi-domain, longitudinal symptom tracking or CPT/RTM billing-code education. We were unable to confirm from ImPACT's own materials whether the platform offers structured between-visit monitoring or billing-documentation support comparable to what a monitoring-focused platform provides — we flag this as publicly unconfirmed rather than assume it does not exist.
Where Kavera Fits
Kavera is designed around the observation that most of the clinical work in concussion — and in the mental-health, cognitive-health, and headache issues that frequently accompany it — happens between visits, not during the 15-minute in-clinic encounter. A single test comparing pre- and post-injury cognitive scores is valuable for a return-to-play decision, but it does not, by itself, tell a physician how a patient's PCSS symptom burden is trending week to week, whether a PHQ-9 score is worsening, or whether sleep quality (via PSQI) is improving as concussion symptoms resolve.
Kavera's assessment battery is delivered to patients on a recurring cadence between scheduled visits, and the resulting data is organized by clinical module — Concussion, Mental Health, Cognitive Health, and Headache — so a practice can see the whole recovery picture, not a single point-in-time score. Because that data is collected on an ongoing basis with documented administration, it is structured to align with RTM billing (98975, 98978, 98980, 98981, 98979) and neurocognitive testing billing (96116/96121, 96132/96133, 96136/96137, 96138/96139, 96146) documentation requirements, rather than existing purely as a clinical convenience. Practices already performing baseline and post-injury cognitive testing with a tool like ImPACT can layer Kavera's between-visit monitoring on top of that workflow to capture the recovery period ImPACT's public materials do not appear to address directly.
Which One Do You Need?
The two products are not strictly interchangeable. If your practice's core need is a validated, credentialed baseline-versus-post-injury comparison for return-to-play decisions — particularly in a school or team setting — ImPACT's model is purpose-built for that. If your practice's core need is tracking a patient's full recovery trajectory across concussion, mood, sleep, and cognitive domains between visits, and turning that data into documentation that supports RTM and neurocognitive testing billing, that is the problem Kavera is built to solve. Some practices reasonably use a baseline/post-injury tool for the return-to-play decision and a between-visit monitoring platform for everything that happens before and after it — including return-to-play decision criteria and the post-concussion recovery timeline.
How Kavera Handles This
ImPACT answers one question: is this patient back to baseline? Kavera runs the whole program after the injury: evaluation, feedback visit, weekly check-ins, brain training, monthly follow-up, and the billing record for every step. Practices that use ImPACT for baseline keep it; Kavera picks up at the first post-injury visit. Self-Serve practices run this with their own staff. On Managed, Juliet Mott's team runs it and bills it under your credentials.