Wearing a cycle helmet may increase risk of injury, says new research

efail wrote:

Am I in the right place to discuss battery hens? I've had a drink, (I'm worried about that comma) before you start.

Well, they've got positives and negatives.

Argus Tuft wrote:

Kitten-I strongly disagree with the opinion expressed in your last post,but I'll die in a ditch defending your right to promote it.

Also - not sure what the point here is.  Is that the same ditch as Boris Johnson was going to be found dead in?  I guess it's still available as he didn't follow through on the promise.

Anyway, I don't get the relevance - I wasn't aware anyone was proposing censorship or a Stalinist purge on the basis of beliefs about helmets, either way.

FluffyKittenofTindalos wrote:

Argus Tuft wrote:

Kitten-I strongly disagree with the opinion expressed in your last post,but I'll die in a ditch defending your right to promote it.

 

Also - not sure what the point here is.  Is that the same ditch as Boris Johnson was going to be found dead in?  I guess it's still available as he didn't follow through on the promise.

 

Anyway, I don't get the relevance - I wasn't aware anyone was proposing censorship or a Stalinist purge on the basis of beliefs about helmets, either way.

Not so much censorship-more bullying and belittlement-And brush up on your Voltaire,Sonny Jim!

John Pitcock wrote:

When I go shopping on my bike, which usually involves going into several shops in a high-street,  I rarely wear a helmet becasue it is an encumberance.

That's probably a situation where a helmet would be of net benefit due to low speeds, kerbs and other street furniture.

John Pitcock wrote:

When I go shopping on my bike, which usually involves going into several shops in a high-street,  I rarely wear a helmet becasue it is an encumberance. I live at the bottom of a steep residential road - when I am returning home wearing a helmet I go faster and take more risks: when I'm not wearing one I am aware of the extra consequences of a fall and go more carefully.

This precisely describes the effects of risk compensation, we see this not just in cycling but in many sports and activities including the work environment/building sites, when RIDDOR was introduced the stats I looked at found that accident rates didn't go down despite the massive increase reporting procedures + hard hat and hi-vis wearing. As with cycling the biggest influence in terms of H&S are down to modifying behaviour of people through work practises, changing environment and enforcing the rules + retraining/refresher and effective supervision/management to ensure people are abiding by the rules in place.

Things like wearing a hard hat on a site is mostly because other people are acting carelessly/recklessly, people wearing hard hats take greater risks on site because they feel more protected, that crane operator wearing a hard hat actually influences how they themselves feel toward risk despite them not actually been at risk themselves so there is an increased chance of incident.This is replicated by the actions of people in cars and their safety cell/protections and backed up in tests on children and adults when studying the effects of risk homeostasis.

The most noticeable effects of helmets in cycling is within competitive racing, despite all the safety changes particularly at elite level where on course protocols have changed, more marshals/warnings of hazards, more barriers and the added better brakes/tyres, cyclists still crash more often, get injured more often and die more often (compared to pre helmet rule era) despite 100% helmet wearing.

CyclingInBeastMode wrote:

John Pitcock wrote:

When I go shopping on my bike, which usually involves going into several shops in a high-street,  I rarely wear a helmet becasue it is an encumberance. I live at the bottom of a steep residential road - when I am returning home wearing a helmet I go faster and take more risks: when I'm not wearing one I am aware of the extra consequences of a fall and go more carefully.

This precisely describes the effects of risk compensation, we see this not just in cycling but in many sports and activities including the work environment/building sites, when RIDDOR was introduced the stats I looked at found that accident rates didn't go down despite the massive increase reporting procedures + hard hat and hi-vis wearing. As with cycling the biggest influence in terms of H&S are down to modifying behaviour of people through work practises, changing environment and enforcing the rules + retraining/refresher and effective supervision/management to ensure people are abiding by the rules in place.

Things like wearing a hard hat on a site is mostly because other people are acting carelessly/recklessly, people wearing hard hats take greater risks on site because they feel more protected, that crane operator wearing a hard hat actually influences how they themselves feel toward risk despite them not actually been at risk themselves so there is an increased chance of incident.This is replicated by the actions of people in cars and their safety cell/protections and backed up in tests on children and adults when studying the effects of risk homeostasis.

 

The most noticeable effects of helmets in cycling is within competitive racing, despite all the safety changes particularly at elite level where on course protocols have changed, more marshals/warnings of hazards, more barriers and the added better brakes/tyres, cyclists still crash more often, get injured more often and die more often (compared to pre helmet rule era)despite 100% helmet wearing.

vonhelmet wrote:

The only thing we can be sure that helmets protect you from is the concerned tutting of onlookers.

Aero helmets can protect quite a bit of your hair from bird poo.

Now, I know the aero helmet makes the effective size of your head bigger, thus increasing the chance of a strike. And I'm also aware that one may risk-compensate and hence be bolder on the poo front. Though I am still on the fence about whether the pigeons give you less space because the helmet is both present and aero. And above a certain speed, the poo would spread over the helmet onto my jersey - 12-15 mph I expect is the limit, and even I won't always be able to slow down to under that - ESPECIALLY WITH MY CABLE DISK BRAKES.

Furthermore, I do not wear an aero helmet because they are mostly more expensive (exception: Carnac) and would make a slow rider like me look an utter wally. But that's my personal decision and cannot be extrapolated to populations, especially as the acceptable degree of walliness cannot be determined in a double blind randomised controlled trial.

More research needed, surely.

vonhelmet wrote:

The only thing we can be sure that helmets protect you from is the concerned tutting of onlookers.

Don't forget the nagging of family-members.
(the reviews of helmets seem to neglect that factor - never mind the physics, how well does it perform at fending off nagging and tutting?)

Mungecrundle wrote:

I have destroyed 3 helmets in my lifetime. Each one I am convinced saved me from a trip to A&E or worse. Each incident involved me taking a risk that I would not have taken had I not been wearing one. I'm pretty sure they are great at saving you from minor injuries on a personal level, but at a population level and after much research I'm changing my opinion towards the negatives outweighing the positives.

What did this process involve? Did you think "I shouldn't do this but what they hey, I've got a helmet on so I will?"

Roubaixcobbles wrote:

Mungecrundle wrote:

I have destroyed 3 helmets in my lifetime. Each one I am convinced saved me from a trip to A&E or worse. Each incident involved me taking a risk that I would not have taken had I not been wearing one. I'm pretty sure they are great at saving you from minor injuries on a personal level, but at a population level and after much research I'm changing my opinion towards the negatives outweighing the positives.

What did this process involve? Did you think "I shouldn't do this but what they hey, I've got a helmet on so I will?"

Pretty much:

1. Attempting to ride down some stone stairs, over handlebars onto edge of a stone wall, deep crease across crown of helmet.

2. Downhill in the wet, lost the front end and head hit the kerb. That was probably more a learning experience about riding in the wet to be fair rather than deliberate decision to take a risk.

3. Racing, overlapped a wheel absolutely smashed my head into the ground also injured my shoulder. I'd never close group ride or race without a helmet, it's inherently risky but the incidents are more likely in the realm that a helmet might save you some skin.

I appreciate that other people's experiences will have led them to different attitudes to what is risky. Personally I refuse to wear a helmet for my commute to work as that should not be an inherently risky activity.

peakingintwomonths wrote:

First post on helmets - eek  - and a request for information rather than an argument.  I had  a recent trip to Copenhagen, then Amsterdam.  In Copenhagen, my impression was that traffic and bikes were not particularly segregated, and a rough estimate (for personal interest) from countimg  cyclists at traffic lights, around 20% wore helmets.  In Amsterdam in the course of a day walking round, I did not see a single helmet - almost every other type of headwear from baseball cap to wooly bunnet, but no helmets. In both cities, there were the expected uncountably (to me) huge number of cyclists. Given the above (admittedly unscientific) observations one would expect that both cities would have very high absolute (not relatively) high numbers of cycling-related head injuries (huge numbers of individuals doing a 'risky' activity).  I cannot find on the internet such data (almost certainly it exisis somewhere), and also for the UK - RoSPA seem to no longer publish such data.  I am aware of the pitfalls of absolute numbers (in the UK trousers were more dangerous than guns),  but at a population level- interesting.  Anyone better placed than me able to access/produce such information ?

You didn't come here to have an argument? 

Seriously ,before you start looking at the number of head injuries,take a look at the number of cycling-related hospital admissions. The effectiveness of helmets can be determined by comparing the ratio of head injuries to the above admissions pre and post helmet laws. The net public benefit of compulsory helmets (reduced activity,diabetes,obesity,etc) looks to be a negative,but that's a separate issue.

Argus Tuft wrote:

You didn't come here to have an argument? 

Seriously ,before you start looking at the number of head injuries,take a look at the number of cycling-related hospital admissions. The effectiveness of helmets can be determined by comparing the ratio of head injuries to the above admissions pre and post helmet laws. The net public benefit of compulsory helmets (reduced activity,diabetes,obesity,etc) looks to be a negative,but that's a separate issue.

The effectiveness cannot be measured in this way.

The reason is given later in your post.

The cycling population changes after mandatory helmet laws are introduced.

If the pre and post law populations are different then any comparison between the two groups is meaningless.

Rich_cb wrote:

Argus Tuft wrote:

You didn't come here to have an argument? 

Seriously ,before you start looking at the number of head injuries,take a look at the number of cycling-related hospital admissions. The effectiveness of helmets can be determined by comparing the ratio of head injuries to the above admissions pre and post helmet laws. The net public benefit of compulsory helmets (reduced activity,diabetes,obesity,etc) looks to be a negative,but that's a separate issue.

The effectiveness cannot be measured in this way. The reason is given later in your post. The cycling population changes after mandatory helmet laws are introduced. If the pre and post law populations are different then any comparison between the two groups is meaningless.

You're right-I'll just take as an indicator until someone can explain it better.

Argus Tuft]</p>

<p>[quote=peakingintwomonths wrote:

before you start looking at the number of head injuries,take a look at the number of cycling-related hospital admissions. The effectiveness of helmets can be determined by comparing the ratio of head injuries to the above admissions pre and post helmet laws. 

Thanks for the reply, but I'm not sure you actually read my post properly.  Never mind, this is the helmet debate.

peakingintwomonths wrote:

First post on helmets - eek  - and a request for information rather than an argument.  I had  a recent trip to Copenhagen, then Amsterdam.  In Copenhagen, my impression was that traffic and bikes were not particularly segregated, and a rough estimate (for personal interest) from countimg  cyclists at traffic lights, around 20% wore helmets.  In Amsterdam in the course of a day walking round, I did not see a single helmet - almost every other type of headwear from baseball cap to wooly bunnet, but no helmets. In both cities, there were the expected uncountably (to me) huge number of cyclists. Given the above (admittedly unscientific) observations one would expect that both cities would have very high absolute (not relatively) high numbers of cycling-related head injuries (huge numbers of individuals doing a 'risky' activity).  I cannot find on the internet such data (almost certainly it exisis somewhere), and also for the UK - RoSPA seem to no longer publish such data.  I am aware of the pitfalls of absolute numbers (in the UK trousers were more dangerous than guns),  but at a population level- interesting.  Anyone better placed than me able to access/produce such information ?

Interestingly Denmark like some other countries have actually been pushing helmet wearing. EU road safety report actually points the finger at DK and NL as being dangerous for cyclists based on deaths per population head and quotes low helmet wearing as to the reason why, utterly ignoring the cycling journey numbers/modal share.

EU road safety commission wants cyclists to wear helmets as part of the solution to the 'problem' of people getting killed, they'd rather offer this up as a solution than to address the actual real problem as to why people on bikes get killed/injured even in countries such as those with very low helmet wearing rates. If you look at their web pages hi-vis and helmets are plastered all over and programmes of introducing helmets are part and parcel of getting people on bikes as part of that, it's similar to bike ed here for both children and adults, helmet and hi-vis or exclusion, basically compulsion via the back door.

Of the circa 3100 SI as part of the STATS19 the estimates vary massively s to which are head injuries, also bearing in mind head injuries covers parts of the head that aren't covered by a helmet, the range covers circa 500-1200 depending on which orgs estimate you accept.

From the general population head injuries reported to hospitals is 1.3million ish with circa 160,000 hospitalisations, that data is from various sources including HEADWAY, there was a data collecting request from E&W hospitals IIRC that came to the figures. So on the basis that a large portion of serious head injuries are not going to require an overnight stay you have a massive disparity between cycling head injuries even on the lawless roads of UK (most of which are caused by criminal motorists) and those from the general population, but only one group is coerced/forced to wear.

IF and so far the IF is actually without strong evidence, helmets actually worked, the one group that requires helmets the least is people riding cycles, used elsewhere would surely save billions if they worked, so why isn't there the focus by UK gov or even the EU seeing as they beleive in the protective values of such?

Nope, it's all about diverting the focus from the real isses at hand, in Australia when they had a crackdown on driving/speeding they saw a significant reduction in cyclist KSIs, then they introduced helmet rules and stopped focussing on motorists, the rest as they say is history, increases in injury rates and lowered cycling.

The whole cycle helmet wearing thing has not just an effect on the individual but the population and the industry/activity as a whole as well as changing the way the law is enforced/upheld and discrimination towards one group only.

It's scary as how this has occured, the removal of freedoms and criminialisation of cycling with less protection by those employed to uphold law and protect us from criminals is abhorrent and in itself is unlawful.

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

Like a breath of fresh air,isn't it?

Argus Tuft wrote:

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

Like a breath of fresh air,isn't it?

A definite whiff of something...

brooksby wrote:

Argus Tuft wrote:

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

Like a breath of fresh air,isn't it?

A definite whiff of something...

5000 odd posts-and you're proud of that? 

Argus Tuft wrote:

brooksby wrote:

Argus Tuft wrote:

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

Like a breath of fresh air,isn't it?

A definite whiff of something...

5000 odd posts-and you're proud of that? 

Yeah, well, I thought it was witty.

Pretty sure you've already said that you think number of posts doesn't equal importance or quality, you Young Turk - I just come here for the social life

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

hawkinspeter wrote:

brooksby wrote:

Did someone leave the gates unlocked at Arkham again...? Seems like there's a sudden influx of opinionated newbies (even being generous and presuming that they're not *intentionally* trolling).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

Huh. Never heard of that before, but yes I think that seems appropriate.

I must be getting old.