No helmet today

cee

BentMikey wrote:

To me common sense says that a little bit of polystyrene is not going to save my life, though it might prevent some cuts and scrapes.

My issue with this is that it really can only take a very minor knock on the head, with minimal speed, for really quite serious brain damage to occur.

Many of my family work in the Healthcare profession and deal with people everyday, who have had minor knocks on the head (not even enough to make a mark/scratch/bruise) but who are now permanently brain damaged. These range from major personality changes, blindness, memory loss, and partial paralysis.

If you have ever seen the inside surface of a skull, you will see that it really is not a friendly place for a brain to be sloshing around in!

For instance, right at the front, behind your forehead, facing in the way, is basically a spike made of bone. As most probably know, when our bodies stop moving suddenly, the internal organs continue to move in the original direction, until they either:

a) Run out of momentum and settle
b) Hit the inside of the body cavity and bounce backward.

in the same way that during a car crash, the passengers and other luggage are thrown forwards.

Now if this is the brain moving inside the cranial cavity, it doesn't take too much of a bang to shift the brain in to that spike, leaving permanent and serious brain injuries.

Again, the knock might not even be hard enogh to leave a mark.

For me (and I stress here that this is my choice, I would not want to enforce it on anyone else), that is why I wear a helmet. Sure, If a truck runs over me, or I slam headfirst at 35mph, 100mph, whatever, then the helmet is as good as useless (at best).

Just don't assume that the minor knocks mentioned previously here can only leave less serious injuries such as cuts and scrapes.

Sorry for such a long post

BentMikey

Always Tyred wrote:

Well, you say that Mikey, but I did, came to the forum and tore it to shreds and asked you to comment on my reasoning. You instead ignored it and came up with some more figures..

IIRC that your "tearing to shreds" was based on personal opinion, and doesn't match the facts of the BC event, nor the other analyses.

cjw

It doesn't take much to casue brain damage and serious injury. This case http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/kent/7389775.stm is where a boy was kicked when on a bouncy castle.

Sam was hurt when the much taller 15-year-old boy caught the left side of his head with his heel while somersaulting on the castle.

The High Court had heard Sam sustained a "very serious and traumatic brain injury" and now needed round-the-clock supervision.

One would have thought this injury was caused by less force than a head impact coming off a bicycle.

BentMikey

And yet there are very few deaths and serious injuries when cycling. Something's not adding up there.

Surf-Matt

David - interesting stuff.

Brakes are an important part of my car decision - the R32 had 336mm stoppers at the front, the current car has 310mm disks and both are very effective indeed.

I've needed to brake heavily and steer on a number of occasions - where I learned decent cadence braking techniques for my old mk2 Gti Golf and Saxo VTR, I have since almost "unlearned" them although I do still pump the brakes a bit out of habit when something looks nasty ahead.

I'm afraid I'm not a car tinkerer - I just buy the best I can and leave it alone (tyres, brake pads, etc). Best stoppers on any car I have driven were probably on the Golf I had - they had more power and less fade than all sorts I have driven, the most underbraked being an Evo FQ360 - amazing car but needs far bigger brakes.

andrewc3142

cjw: So should kids wear helmets on bouncy castles? Sounds like a bit of a one-off to me, about the same risk as stumbling whilst walking on the pavement and banging your head on a lamp-post.

TheFoolio888

andrewc3142 wrote:

cjw: So should kids wear helmets on bouncy castles? Sounds like a bit of a one-off to me, about the same risk as stumbling whilst walking on the pavement and banging your head on a lamp-post.

I think the point is that a small bump to the head can be as dangerous as a big one. Regardless of what causes the bump.

Therefore...the fact that cycle helmets do not protect against high speed impacts is a bit of a red herring...because they CAN protect against low speed impacts.

cjw

Some interesting stats here as well http://www.helmets.org/stats.htm

To summarise the part that most caught my attention...

Bicycle Deaths by Helmet Use
1994-2006

The first % is those NOT wearing a helmet (so for each year, cyclists killed NOT wearing a helmet represent generally over 95% of cyclists).

1994 776 (97%) 19 (2%) 796
1995 783 (95%) 34 (4%) 828
1996 731 (96%) 27 (4%) 761
1997 785 (97%) 23 (3%) 811
1998 741 (98%) 16 (2%) 757
1999 698 (93%) 42 (6%) 750
2000 622 (90%) 50 (7%) 689
2001 616 (84%) 60 (8%) 729
2002 589 (89%) 54 (8%) 663
2003 535 (85%) 58 (9%) 626
2004 602 (83%) 87 (12%) 722
2005 676 (86%) 77 (10%) 784
2006 730 (95%) 37 (5%) 770

AND

Statistics from New York City
New York issued a statement on their bicycle safety study including these numbers:
Bicycle lanes and helmets may reduce the risk of death.

Almost three-quarters of fatal crashes (74%) involved a head injury.
Nearly all bicyclists who died (97%) were not wearing a helmet.
Helmet use among those bicyclists with serious injuries was low (13%), but it was even lower among bicyclists killed (3%).

Now clearly one needs to correlate against helmet use. And from Statistics from the Consumer Product Safety Commission Bicycle helmet usage has increased from 18 percent in 1991 to 50 percent in 1998. So 50% of cyclist wear helmets, therefore surely if helmets were ineffective in preventing death surely one would expect deaths of those not wearing helmets to be 50% as well. Not 98% from the first table.

always_tyred

BentMikey wrote:

Always Tyred wrote:

Well, you say that Mikey, but I did, came to the forum and tore it to shreds and asked you to comment on my reasoning. You instead ignored it and came up with some more figures..

IIRC that your "tearing to shreds" was based on personal opinion, and doesn't match the facts of the BC event, nor the other analyses.

What is it that you don't understand?

"Opinion" is stating that a reduction in cycling injury is a result of general road safety measures, a statement based on nothing but conjecture.

"Observation" is that helmet uptake was very significant in the period preceding the law. Again, the analysis that I am picking fault with assumes that this is not the case. They have to make this assumption in order to be able to discount the data for the year preceding the helmet law, said data indicating a significant drop in cycling head injuries. Again, this is a baseless assumption on their part, indicating to me that their analysis started with a conclusion. I'm not sure its supposed to be that way around.

Given that I was living there and you weren't you may have to defer to my greater knowledge on just this one point. If you don't believe me, get yourself onto a North American forum and post the question. There are 2.2 million people in Vancouver, I'm sure someone will remember.

always_tyred

cjw wrote:

1994 776 (97%) 19 (2%) 796
1995 783 (95%) 34 (4%) 828
1996 731 (96%) 27 (4%) 761
1997 785 (97%) 23 (3%) 811
1998 741 (98%) 16 (2%) 757
1999 698 (93%) 42 (6%) 750
2000 622 (90%) 50 (7%) 689
2001 616 (84%) 60 (8%) 729
2002 589 (89%) 54 (8%) 663
2003 535 (85%) 58 (9%) 626
2004 602 (83%) 87 (12%) 722
2005 676 (86%) 77 (10%) 784
.

I'm sure I have seen these data analysed as follows;

1. Cycling deaths consistent across sample period
2. Helmet use increased substantially suring sample period
3. Therefore, helmets don't reduce cycling deaths

Amazing how stats can be interpreted, eh? Of course, I'm not sure the final 2 columns were presented.

In fairness, the analysis (this entirely from memory) suggested that RTA's changed by a given percentage over the same period, traffic up by a certain percentage, overall cycling use down by a certain percentage. The analysis them made linear correlations between expected accident risks and volume of traffic (which seems terribly simplistic) in order to estimate what cycling injury trends should have been, and concluded that cycling was getting more dangerous despite helmet uptake - thus indicating that helmets did nothing.

Of course, it would be possible to postulate that cycling risks increase in some way other than linerarly with traffic volume and that there is no data to indicate the comparative increase in non-cycle helmet cycling risk over the same period.

I see that, provided with the overall cylcling mileage data, it would, in fact, be able to make this calculation.

But anything other than the cyclehelmets.org analysis is, of course, opinion.

cjw

The key in the two stats though is that 50% (1998) of cyclists were helmet users - admittedly doesn't mean they wore them at the time of death - and would therefore fall into the non-helmet wearing stats. In 1998 of the cyclists that died, 98% were NOT wearing helmets and 2% were. IF 50% of cyclists were wearing helmets at the time of accident AND the hypothesis was that helmets had no effect on cyclist death, then one would expect 50% of deaths were helmet wearers and 50% were non helmet wearers.

Now this IS Entire Population data that Mr. Mikey is so keen on however seems to show that helmets are incredibly effective in saving lives.

hoathy

redddraggon wrote:

Surf-Matt wrote:

And this is from someone with a Materials Engineering degree who has done more impact tests than you've had hot dinners.

There does seem to be an extraordinary amount of Materials Scientists on this forum........are we really that common?

I did a bit of materials in my engineering degree....

always_tyred

cjw wrote:

The key in the two stats though is that 50% (1998) of cyclists were helmet users - admittedly doesn't mean they wore them at the time of death - and would therefore fall into the non-helmet wearing stats. In 1998 of the cyclists that died, 98% were NOT wearing helmets and 2% were. IF 50% of cyclists were wearing helmets at the time of accident AND the hypothesis was that helmets had no effect on cyclist death, then one would expect 50% of deaths were helmet wearers and 50% were non helmet wearers.

Now this IS Entire Population data that Mr. Mikey is so keen on however seems to show that helmets are incredibly effective in saving lives.

That's just your opinion on what you'd expect.

I'm joking. I agree with your analysis. I'm pretty sure, though, that those data have been presented by others as I suggested.

There's an interesting point here about lack of peer review. Reports that have been subject to it, if they are pro or anti, are measured and cautious in their conclusions, reflecting the nature of the information they are dealing with. My concern over the reports in places such as cyclehelmets.org is that they make plausible seeming, definitive conclusions which, on closer inspection, require a number of assumptions that aren't acknowledged or alluded to. This is precisely the sort of thing that peer review flushes out - colleagues pointedly asking how such and such a statement was derived. Peer review is not perfect, but its a lot better than nothing and its there for a reason.

My opinion (and this is certainly an opinion) is that it is no coincidence that the "maverick" element is always anti-helmet. Why do you have to go against the grain in order to conclude that helmets are pointless? Why don't impartial, peer reviewed studies come to those conclusions? Is there a grand conspiracy to hoodwink us all into wearing egg cartons on out heads?

I think un-moderated science-bunkum is dangerous to the uninitiated or the unsuspecting. We all fall into the latter category sometimes. Its just the same (to me) as alternative therapists with about half an hour's training decrying modern medicine and claiming to have "an answer". Or cosmetics companies claiming to have a betahydroxy woofter that, according to some cartoon of the skin, traps moisture and makes you look up to 70% younger (results may vary).

andrewc3142

My opinion (and this is certainly an opinion) is that it is no coincidence that the "maverick" element is always anti-helmet.

At last, a compliment to us non-wearers.

Sea_Green_Incorruptible

Oh the humanity!

Page 12 and still it goes on!

cjw

There's an interesting point here about lack of peer review.

Exactly and I entirely agree. Believe it or not... I am also a materials scientist! Specialism is steels and sensitisation in nuclear reactors (well at least was about 20 years ago). Now I am undertaking a doctorate and that requires real research and ---- PEER REVIEW. Most of the jusnk that is quoted in most of the supposed research I've seen here is just opinion and often misrepresents the data. I recall on a previous helmet discussion one chap posted a load of papers supposedly showing that helmets caused harm. I quickly reviewed each and all of them did the exact opposite. The poster had simply quoted the caveats or partial statements from the conclusion.

The very quick analysis I did could (and should) be torn apart under peer review. However the statement that there is no evidence that helmets are effective is not correct. At the sample level there is substantial eveidence that a helmet should reduce severity of an impact to the head. To then say that this does not stack up at the population level depends on the eveidence examined. I would expect a more robust analysis of the data I hoghlighted to be informative.

I suspect (but probably caouldn't prove) that the probelm with population data in the UK relates to the collection of data... and that it iis not collected for the purposes of analysing cycle helmet accident stats.

Australian data can show no impact in the early days of legislation, but later analysis does seem to show a reduction.

For Canada, I think you make a very good point about previous to legislation there would have been an enormous campaign to increase helmet use. Same in Australia I expect... no Govt suddenly brings in a law like that without years of support previously. Think of the smoking ban in the UK and the advertising and free support to give up smoking through NHS before it came into effect. As with the helmets, I wouldn't be suprised if an analysis of smoking the day before the ban and 6 months later showed almost no effect as most people who would give up would have done so before the ban's effect.

cjw

Sea_Green_Incorruptible wrote:

Oh the humanity!

Page 12 and still it goes on!

LOL, twas you who made page 12

richardast

Materials science??
Is that what we used to call woodwork/metalwork when I was at school?

cjw

Not really... physics with
chemistry mostly with electron microscopes. I'm shite at metalwork and woodwork.

always_tyred

No, you are thinking of "Male Bonding"

cjw

Ahhh.... superglue

cjw

And I am looking forward to the debate on those stats!

BentMikey

Ah yes, helmets.org being quoted as an unbiased source, LOL!

You are aware that a large portion of cyclist fatalities would have been fatal anyway if you took out any head injury element?

dirk_van_gently

Quoting myself, seems a bit bonkers, but as the first responder to the original posting I wrote

Dirk Van Gently wrote:

Belv
Now i am well aware of the debate and i'm not trying to re-open that.

Amen to that 8)

12 pages Later!

cjw

BentMikey wrote:

Ah yes, helmets.org being quoted as an unbiased source, LOL!

You are aware that a large portion of cyclist fatalities would have been fatal anyway if you took out any head injury element?

Ah Mikey, that's pretty weak. The stats are only presented there.. they are from US Dept for Transportation. Please explain how 98% of fatalities were not wearing a helmet.

And you are aware that almost three-quarters of fatal crashes (74%) involved a head injury.

cjw

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/pagerender.fcgi?artid=1067558&pageindex=3

And similar data from an Australian study (Children in this case). Of the fatalities, 52 died from head injuries alone, 25 from multiple injuries (including head injuries), 10 from abdominal injuries and one from a ruptured aorta.

Head injuries are the main cause of fatality.

BentMikey

I must say, those stats are quite striking, and run counter to what I'd expect. I'll need to do some digging. I also recall seeing that head injuries being the most common cause of death is not correct, but I'll need to find a reference.

If the stuff you guys have recently posted was all true, then why aren't helmets enforced everywhere? The effectiveness of helmets would be far beyond doubt. The Australian and Canadian situations don't show effectiveness of helmets, so there is a conflict here.

cjw

However there is research that does show a positive effect of legislation.

The effect of bicycle helmet legislation on bicycling fatalities
Darren Grant 1, Stephen M. Rutner 2
1Department of Economics, University of Texas-Arlington
2Department of Management, Marketing, and Logistics, Georgia Southern University


Abstract
A number of states passed legislation in the 1990s requiring youths to wear helmets when riding bicycles. The effect of this legislation on bicycling fatalities is examined by subjecting data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System to a panel analysis, using a control-group methodology. A helmet law reduces fatalities by about 15 percent in the long run, less in the short run. There is no evidence of spillover effects (to adults) or substitution effects (youths choosing other methods of transportation) associated with implementation of a helmet law. Through 2000, existing helmet laws have saved 130 lives. If all states had adopted helmet laws in 1975, more than 1500 lives would have been saved. © 2004 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.

cjw

And...

Children's bicycle helmet use and injuries in Hillsborough County, Florida before and after helmet legislation
K D Liller1, J Nearns1, M Cabrera1, B Joly2, V Noland3, R McDermott1

1 University of South Florida College of Public Health, Tampa, Florida
2 Maine Center for Public Health, Augusta, Maine
3 University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida

Correspondence to:
Associate Professor Karen DeSafey Liller, University of South Florida College of Public Health, 13201 Bruce B Downs Blvd, Tampa, FL 33612, USA;
kliller@hsc.usf.edu


ABSTRACT
The purpose of this research was to explore the changes in children's bicycle helmet use and motor vehicle bicycle related injuries in Hillsborough County, Florida before and after passage of the Florida's bicycle helmet law for children under the age of 16. The results show a significant increase in bicycle helmet use among children, ages 5–13, in the post-law years compared with the pre-law years. Also, there has been a significant decline in the rates of bicycle related motor vehicle injuries among children in the post-law years compared with the pre-law years. Although there have been complementary educational and outreach activities in the county to support helmet use, it appears that the greatest increase in use occurred after the passage of the helmet law. It is recommended that educational efforts continue to sustain helmet use rates and decreases in injuries.

cjw

Another Reference on Head injury as the major cause for you...

A large majority of bicycling deaths and disabling injuries result from head injury.
About 75% of all bicyclist fatalities, and two-thirds of hospital admissions for
bicycling injury involve head trauma (Rivara et al., 1998).