Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

For all discussions about this "lively" subject. All topics that are substantially about helmet usage will be moved here.
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NATURAL ANKLING
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by NATURAL ANKLING »

Hi,
mattheus wrote: 3 Aug 2021, 2:33pm
NATURAL ANKLING wrote: 3 Aug 2021, 2:16pm Concussion after a week had subsided so I did not mention at all.
My reason for hospital was after a week I could not bear weight on my left leg, so I was reported as a cycling accident but that's all, helmet was not mentioned.
I don't know what point you're trying to make here, but clearly if you wait until some of your symptoms clear-up before going to hospital, that is going to skew your tiny contribution to the statistics.
Not really a surprise, is it?!?


In general, if you have a nasty head injury - irrespective of other less glamorous ailments - you are likely to go to A&E/minor-injuries, or be taken there by some kind person. On average I would say that a bleeding head-wound will get more immediate attention than minor twinges to limbs and the like (concussion being Serious Business that needs assessing ASAP, and of course the blood that tends to gush from even quite minor head wounds, in an attention-grabbing way. As I could recently testify to ...)
The point I was trying to make was that I never said I was wearing a helmet at hospital.

I go to hospital when I think I really need to.
Its no surprise to see the A&E crowded with swollen fingers and sprains and the entourage of sunday afternoon DIY'ers :)
NA Thinks Just End 2 End Return + Bivvy - Some day Soon I hope
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Please forgive the poor Grammar I blame it on my mobile and phat thinkers.
Debs
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Debs »

slowster
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by slowster »

briansnail
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by briansnail »

Every cycling magazine I pick up discusses the merits .... and demerits of helmets. The latter chiefly because they may not protect fully.
Is it overkill to use a motor bike helmet. I cycle in winter early morning when it gets to minus. It would at least be warmer,
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pjclinch
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by pjclinch »

briansnail wrote: 5 Feb 2022, 3:52pm Every cycling magazine I pick up discusses the merits .... and demerits of helmets. The latter chiefly because they may not protect fully.
Is it overkill to use a motor bike helmet. I cycle in winter early morning when it gets to minus. It would at least be warmer,
If you want to be warm you're quite possibly better off with a hat designed to be warmer, rather than one where it's largely an unintended side-effect of the impact protection and your ears aren't taken in to account.
I use a Walz wool neck & ear-flap cap to stay warm on a cold day, unless it's properly winter in which case a Lowe Mountain Cap (waterproof shell with a fleece lining and ear/neck flaps). You could put a lid over the Walz if you wanted to.

Pete.
Often seen riding a bike around Dundee...
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Hellhound
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Hellhound »

briansnail wrote: 5 Feb 2022, 3:52pm Every cycling magazine I pick up discusses the merits .... and demerits of helmets. The latter chiefly because they may not protect fully.
Is it overkill to use a motor bike helmet. I cycle in winter early morning when it gets to minus. It would at least be warmer,
Motor bike no. Too heavy.
Full face DH helmet yes if you want to cook your head :lol:
You're better off with a Winter casquette
Image
Or similar.
50sbiker
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by 50sbiker »

[XAP]Bob wrote: 27 Jun 2021, 12:39pm
50sbiker wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 10:30am Go scrape your forehead along the road...With and without helmet...Then tell me it makes no difference wearing a helmet.
Great advert for cycling gloves, because all you're trying to protect against is minor scrapes.
I know people who have smashed their entire face in whilst wearing a lid (and they would likely have been much less badly injured if they hadn't been, since it wouldn't have twisted their face into the corner of the car by catching on the roof rail). I have come off my bike a number of times over the years, and the only times I've ever hit a lid were on the garage door.

Neither of those are more than anecdote, but common sense is built on anecdotes, not science. The common sense tells me that my brain knows exactly how big my head is, and is very well designed/adapted to protect the head at that size and mass.

Science tells me that we have survived for many many generations without cycle helmets, even though our travelling speed was much the same (a decent runner, as would all our ancestors have been, can run a 5 minute mile - i.e. sustain 12mph for an hour).
Science tells me that the spec for a lid is based on an impact with a flat surface at 12mph - and no account is made of rotational behaviour (unlike specifications for motorcycle helmets).
Science tells me that a disembodied head (for that is how lids are tested) will hit the ground at just over 13 mph (assuming it falls 1.8m at 9.8m/s^2).
i.e. lids are only designed to protect against a simple fall, one that may result in a big bruise, even a few cuts. They aren't designed to protect against potentially brain injuring collisions, and may even make them worse by converting linear acceleration into rotational acceleration (which the brain, cocooned in its strong bone shell and fluid bath, is much less well able to tolerate).

Social sciences tells us that even the promotion of lids as a safety measure drastically reduces the number of people willing to cycle, but we know that cycling has massive health benefits, outweighing any risk several times over.
We know that walking and cycling result in about the same number of fatalities as each other per mile travelled - yet no-one seems keen on walking helmets.
We know that alcohol consumption massively increases the risk of head injury - yet no-one seems keen on drinking helmets.


NICE statistics show:
https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/qs74/documents/head-injury-briefing-paper2 wrote:Each year, 1.4 million people attend emergency departments in England and Wales with a recent head injury. Between 33% and 50% of these are children aged under 15 years. Annually, about 200,000 people are admitted to hospital with head injury. Of these, one-fifth have features suggesting skull fracture or have evidence of brain damage. The incidence of death from head injury is low, with as few as 0.2% of all patients attending emergency departments with a head injury dying as a result.
Note that head injury here explicitly excludes face/jaw injuries as convention.

There are only ~4000 cyclists seriously injured each year, and not all of those will be head injuries (I'd say a broken leg is serious for example).
Since it is certain that not all serious injuries are head injuries, and it is also pretty certain that the most serious head injuries will be accompanied by other injuries (how often do we read that a London cyclist was crushed by an HGV, but "they weren't wearing a helmet" - as if that would have done anything at all to change the outcome - I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say that 50% of serious injuries are primarily head injury (I suspect that is a massive over estimate).
Any thought that is put into protecting against head injuries should really be focussed elsewhere - at best you're going to slightly affect 1% of head injuries.

In terms of health interventions - getting people on bikes is far more valuable than any effect that lids could possibly bring.
If we spent half the effort that goes into promoting the least effect possible method of preventing injuries (PPE is always a last resort), on actually making safer cycling routes, legislation that supported active transport, and education on the concept of a public highway then we would make far more difference than plastic ever could.
Waffle...do as i suggest,show me the resultant pictures make no difference to your skin, then I might take you seriously.
50sbiker
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by 50sbiker »

Mike Sales wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 7:17pm
50sbiker wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 10:30am Go scrape your forehead along the road...With and without helmet...Then tell me it makes no difference wearing a helmet.
Do you (or would you) feel less safe cycling without a helmet?
When you feel less safe do you take more care?
Helmets offer, at best, very limited protection, which is easily used up by a belief that they make you safe.
Never mind the amateur psychology,go bang your head off the wall with and without a helmet,tell me it makes no difference then we can discuss Freud.
50sbiker
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by 50sbiker »

slowster wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 1:50pm
50sbiker wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 10:30am Go scrape your forehead along the road...With and without helmet...Then tell me it makes no difference wearing a helmet.
Go learn about proper evidence based science.
Go bang your head off the wall with/without helmet...For some first person proper science..not opinions.
50sbiker
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by 50sbiker »

It is not like we are discussing Flat Earth or God here ..I defy anyone here EVER to tell me gravel rash on your head hurts less without a helmet...Dreamers.
Blondie
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Blondie »

50sbiker wrote: 19 Feb 2022, 1:20pm
slowster wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 1:50pm
50sbiker wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 10:30am Go scrape your forehead along the road...With and without helmet...Then tell me it makes no difference wearing a helmet.
Go learn about proper evidence based science.
Go bang your head off the wall with/without helmet...For some first person proper science..not opinions.
Then go replace your helmet as recommended
50sbiker
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by 50sbiker »

Wearing my cycling helmet does not make me more prone to risk taking anymore than donning my rubber sole shoes for work makes me more likely to poke my fingers up the electrical mains,Just to test them,, or my immunity to electrocution.
Steady rider
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Steady rider »

Robinson refers to the Wasserman data that details the incidence of cyclists hitting their head/helmet during an 18-month period was “significantly higher for helmet wearers (8/40 vs 13/476 - i.e. 20% vs 2.7%, p 0.00001)." A bare head width of approximately 150mm may avoid contact compared to a helmeted head at approximately 200mm wide (Clarke 2007 ). Assuming the 20% and 2.7% figures are typical, the increased risk of impact for helmeted is about seven times higher. A degree of protection could be expected plus a degree of risk from the extra impacts.
Robinson DL; Head injuries and bicycle helmet laws; Accid Anal Prev, 28, 4: p 463-475, 1996
http://www.cycle-helmets.com/robinson-head-injuries.pdf
Clarke CF, The Case against bicycle helmets and legislation, VeloCity Munich, 2007. http://www.ta.org.br/site/Banco/7manuai ... helmet.pdf

StClair and Chinn reported ‘However, in both low speed linear impacts and the most severe oblique cases, linear and rotational accelerations may increase to levels corresponding to injury severities as high as AIS 2 or 3, at which a marginal increase (up to 1 AIS interval) in injury outcome may be expected for a helmeted head.’
StClair VJ, Chinn BP, Transport Research Laboratory (Great Britain). 1993. Project report. Crowthorne, Berkshire: Transport Research Laboratory .Assessment of current bicycle helmets for the potential to cause rotational injury (trb.org)  
https://trid.trb.org/view/810710

Moore et al reported on adult cyclist post-concussion syndrome (PCS) that “The mean duration of PCS for helmet wearers was 22.9 months, and 16.8 months for patients not wearing a helmet at the time of concussion (p=0.41)”, and ‘We found that patients with one or more previous concussions had a greater duration of symptoms compared with those with no previous concussions (p=0.042). This is consistent with our previous study showing those with previous concussions have a longer recovery period. Covassin et al also found that athletes with previous concussions took longer to recover compared with those without a concussion history’.
Moore C, Baharikhoob P, Khodadadi M, et al Bicycling-related concussions leading to postconcussion syn-drome in adults BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine 2020;6:e000746. doi: 10.1136/bmjsem-2020-000746
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... _in_adults 

From the above it shows helmet wearers hitting their helmets more often, than would occur for non-wearers hitting their head. It shows helmets can increase the head injury severity in some impacts. It shows the mean duration of PCS can be longer for helmet wearers.
Other evidence shows helmet use can increase the accident rate, Clarke CF, Gillham C, Effects of bicycle helmet wearing on accident and injury rates, GB National Road Safety Conference, November 2019 https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... jury_rates
Jdsk
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Jdsk »

Steady rider wrote: 19 Feb 2022, 3:43pmStClair and Chinn reported ‘However, in both low speed linear impacts and the most severe oblique cases, linear and rotational accelerations may increase to levels corresponding to injury severities as high as AIS 2 or 3, at which a marginal increase (up to 1 AIS interval) in injury outcome may be expected for a helmeted head.’
StClair VJ, Chinn BP, Transport Research Laboratory (Great Britain). 1993. Project report. Crowthorne, Berkshire: Transport Research Laboratory .Assessment of current bicycle helmets for the potential to cause rotational injury (trb.org)  
https://trid.trb.org/view/810710
Yet more selective quotation. I recommend that everyone reads the whole thing, but if they don't here's that same piece with with its immediate predecessor in bold:

"Overall, it was concluded that for the majority of cases considered, the helmet can provide life saving protection during typical linear impacts and, in addition, the typical level of rotational acceleration observed using a helmeted headform would generally be no more injurious than expected for a bare human head. However, in both low speed linear impacts and the most severe oblique cases, linear and rotational accelerations may increase to levels corresponding to injury severities as high as AIS 2 or 3, at which a marginal increase (up to 1 AIS interval) in injury outcome may be expected for a helmeted head."

My emboldening.

It's a sensible report suggesting improved assessment of helmets. It isn't an argument not to wear a helmet.

Jonathan
Last edited by Jdsk on 19 Feb 2022, 4:06pm, edited 1 time in total.
Jdsk
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Re: Evaluating the impact of cycle helmet use...

Post by Jdsk »

Steady rider wrote: 19 Feb 2022, 3:43pm Moore et al reported on adult cyclist post-concussion syndrome (PCS) that “The mean duration of PCS for helmet wearers was 22.9 months, and 16.8 months for patients not wearing a helmet at the time of concussion (p=0.41)”...

Moore C, Baharikhoob P, Khodadadi M, et al Bicycling-related concussions leading to postconcussion syn-drome in adults BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine 2020;6:e000746. doi: 10.1136/bmjsem-2020-000746
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... _in_adults 
A totally cherrypicked quotation from that study. Far from it showing harmful effects of wearing helmets the authors wrote:

"Brain injury prevention measures suggested by this study include legislation requiring all-age helmet use, addition of bicycling infra- structure and safe bicycling practices such as speed reduction."

My emboldening.
...
Steady rider wrote: 19 Feb 2022, 3:43pmIt shows the mean duration of PCS can be longer for helmet wearers.
Steady rider's misunderstanding of the meaning of p=0.41 is discussed here:
viewtopic.php?p=1592035#p1592035

Jonathan
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