Helmets

A snowHead

Nick L,

My points are that for me personally

1) the NNT would appear to be lower as far as risk of death is concerned on an annualised basis for my driving rather than my skiing.

2)There may be unwanted side effects of the treatment, again for me personally namely that I may ski faster and put myself and possibly others at greater risk of other injuries that are more common than head injuries.

I completely agree for some groups the risk of head injury may be greater than the average and for them a helmet may be advisable. wink

A snowHead

Nick L, but...

My understanding is that one of the counter arguments is that wearing a helmet pre-disposes the wearer to risk(ier) behaviour so that in your NNTT case you may find that in extremisadding helmets INCREASES the probability of a serious head injury.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I have a Giro 9.9. It is comfy, light, I can take the vents and ear flaps off if it gets hot and as far as a being a woman goes, the great thing is it doesn't flatten my curly hair anything like a bobble hat did!

That must be a big selling point! Very Happy

You need to Login to know who's really who.

good posts on this thread

how about this as a summary:

1. helmets are not a dumb idea or a mere fashion statement
2. the case for wearing a helmet is not sufficiently strong that anyone who chooses not to for economic, comfort or fashion reasons is dumb

with the obvious implication that we should live and let live and not rubbish each others views

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

I'm firmly in the "I really should buy a helmet because i can't insist my daughter wears one unless I too am wearing one" camp.

The mission now is to find one that is comfortable and cool (as in temperature not fashion).

From my experiences wearing cycle helmets which I adopted for the same reasons above I suspect I may find that I am "undressed without one". Certainly on the rare occasions I cycle without a helmet I feel nervous. a feeling I also get when not wearing a seat belt because I am only swapping the cars over.

Following on nearly from the lack of evidence that helmets make a difference is there any evidence (even anecdotal) of them causing injury to the wearer excluding the feeling safer so sliding more dangerously argument?

You'll need to Register first of course.

Thanks for clearing that up jedster. I'd forgotten what we were talking about. Laughing

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

never thought about a helmet until 4 years ago when a guy staying in the same chalet as me had a bad fall which put him in bed for 2 weeks , broke his snowboard in half, never seen that before, and 'punchtured ' his helmet after hitting his head on a rock...within 48hrs all guests had lashed out on a helmet! ....always wear one now on/off piste and never give it a thought, if you want to wear one thats ok if you prefer the wind in your hair likewise.. personally could cope with broken leg but not with broken head..

After all it is free

ashton parkers, point on being undressed without one is true - I've worn a helmet for three years - and would simply feel uncomfortable now without it. Its had cause to save me once, I know I would have been hospitalised without it - I did get whiplash thou and couldn't lift my head off the pillow the next day without using my hands to lift the weight - but hey ho, at least I got the snowboard another day !

The issue of exposing yourself to increased risk BECAUSE you're wearing a helmet is a fair point but not one I've experieced in reality - but then I seem to have an increasing sense of my own mortality as I get older....

In terms of temperature - I was worried about that, being a sweaty chap, however it is not an issue I have found to be a real problem. When riding, the 'draft' helps to keep you cool. ( And my helmet does have too much in the way of venting - its a CEBE one ) The more suprising issue was the cold - on colder days, you definately need a skull cap or similar to keep your noggin warm - I have a light fleece beanie which does the trick and on warm cold days (! if that isn't a paradox ) I use one of those Buff thingys

T Bar, I think I failed to make a point which is relevant here - that if you die, you Skullie

die. Everybody is upset (including the insurance companies) but the financial and emotional costs are finite.
Serious head injuries which don't result in death but in disability and personality change have continuing ongoing costs in terms of care, loss of income and emotional costs to the sufferer and their loved ones. I'm more afraid of being a burden than dying (I think Puzzled

)

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

Nick L, a very good point. Also we use NNTT (or NNTH) in the NHS because we have a finite set of resources, we cannot afford all the interventions available so we need to do NNTTs and cost benefit analyses to work out what is the most cost effective so that we can spend our money to bring the largest benefit to the largest amount of people.

As individuals we are in a slightly different position, in that we are unlikely to spend money on a helmet instead of some other more cost effective intervention (such as insurance for instance), rather the money for a helmet is likely to come out of our recreational budget if you see what I mean.

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

I’m just back from a rather empty gym and with nothing else to distract me I’ve been pondering. Particularly as I am contemplating the whole helmet thing for myself. Here are a few hypotheses, please feel free to shoot them, me, etc down.

There are some situations where helmets are clearly appropriate. Outside of these, it may be more appropriate to ban them.

Kids: should wear helmets for a number of reasons.
1. They are at the right height to have significantly high risk of being side swiped or have things dropped on them. It’s only fair on them to try and give them a fun holiday too.
2. It’s not that they have no concept of fear but that they have no concept of risk. Kids spend a whole lot more time falling over, bumping into things, etc. While I don’t think the risk of serious head injury is high, they’re in exactly the scenario where a helmet will protect them from more minor but painful and upsetting injuries.
3. It salves parents’ guilt at exposing their precious darlings to a relatively risky environment.

Racers: should wear helmets. By nature of their activity they spend most of their time skiing at the edge of their stability, speed, endurance, strength and forgiveness envelope. Therefore they fall frequently and at high speed. The least they can do is try and ensure that that skid down the icy slalom course doesn’t scalp them.

This does not generalise into the "normal" skiing population! wink

Snowboarders: should wear helmets because the way they fall pre-disposes them to head strikes. Or, it did at least to me.

Americans wink

: should wear helmets. A lot of N. American skiing is in the trees. This isn’t IMHO the same as tree skiing in Europe. Many NA resorts construct “glades” by pruning the aspens (etc.) resulting in what resembles a reasonably open mogul field with a small tree every few bumps. Great fun, but one’s risk of being spat out into a tree is high. A helmet may reduce your injuries.

In the park: you should wear a helmetas you’re taking air and if you lose your air sense half way round, you need all the protection you can get.

Outside of that, I wonder whether the aggregate effect is not more similar to seatbelts. Example, I was driven in a full car to a meeting last week. One of the seatbelts was jammed under the seat so I didn’t wear one. I was significantly less happy at speed and wanted the driver to drive more slowly than I would had I had a seatbelt on. One could extend this to, “I drive faster wearing a seatbelt”. (Someone once suggested that the best road safety device would be a large and very sharp spike on the steering wheel 2cm from the driver’s chest and pointing straight in). It is possible that although seatbelts have positive secondary safety features, they have negative primary ones. I.e. in an accident you probably want one but mandating their use increases the total number of accidents.

I have a strong feeling that outside these scenarios above the principle effect of helmet wearing is to wrongly and falsely increase wearer confidence in some cases. "I'm wearing a helmet so it's OK."

My suspicion is that the aggregate effect might be to increase the gross numbers of all injuries. At the extreme this might lead to an argument that they should be banned outside these special situations? Is one cracked head worth 20 collisions?

A helmet is secondary/passive protection. Shouldn’t we should focus on primary/active protection – lessons, education, etc.

snow reports

I may have to get one however for trees, park. I have a racing one...

Like Richie, I'd say temperature isn't a problem (I'm tend to sweat a lot when doing any sport) and haven't had problem with the helmet being too hot. Having worn a helmet for a few seasons now I also find that it feels very natural to wear and as others have said it feels 'strange' to ski without one. I've recently had to wear glasses and initially I hated them as I was very aware of them but after a few days I didn't notice them. Wearing a helmet is the same, very quickly you are not aware of it as you tend to concentrate of the fantastic time your having.

The report in ski-injury mentioned that there was no evidence of increased recklessness in helmet wearers, though its possible there wil be some individuals that would feel a false sense of security.

Also when accidents of helemt wearers were looked at there was no evidence of increased neck injuries.

If a ski accident is bad enough that it might kill you a helmet is unlikely to make any differnce to the outcome.

But as has already been said the type of head injury where you could be disabled etc. then a helmet MAY make a difference to the outcome. The fact that this may be a once in a lifetime event may mean some people will take the risk whilst others will believe the small cost outlay is worth it.

Its probably fair to say that most people are confident of their own ability and as such consider the risk to be small. Unfortunately its the other people that are the worry.

My son is just coming up to 20 and although I would have pressed the issue to compel him to wear a helmet, he made the decission himself. I'm not going to say to anyone (outside my familty) they should wear a helmet its their decission. Just as I don't expect anyone to say to me I shouldn't.

You know it makes sense.

David Murdoch, some interesting stuff. On racers though, they actually fall over a lot less than the average punter, for obvious reasons - and spend by far the greater part of their snow time away from gates. But as I understand it they wear helmets because from experience they've learnt that sooner or later that knock will happen that they 'know' could have done some damage - minor or major. Plus it keeps them warm. They don't take them off when they're skiing well within their limits, wherever they are on the mountain.

Same applies to body armour, which they wear most of the time these days.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

PG, Oh? Darn, there goes one of my assumptions! Although do you agree that they are skiing within a special situation that does not easily generalise to the general population?

A snowHead

David Murdoch, agreed, though it kind of works both ways - despite their skills and the odds being against them falling, even at speed (unless they're right on the limit) they're still glad to be wearing a helmet at all times. Don't think it's just a question of 'feeling' safer - that could be dangerous. But over for example ten years of skiing, say 4,000 hours on the slopes, they'll have cracked their heads with sufficient force enough times to realise they could have been hurt otherwise.

A snowHead

PG, although they do help to keep your teeth in-situ when having a bash at slalom.

They tend to be racers who like to take their aggresion out by hitting gates as often as possible.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

PG, I can well imagine! Ouch!!

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Whist enjoying the debate thats been put forward here, I don't really get the need to try and justify why people don't want to wear a helmet by dressing up some stats on 'false sense' of security... [ it is an interesting debate thou ! ]

In my experience people generally don't want to wear helmets because :

a) they are /were perceived as uncool
b) they like the wind in their hair
c) they prefer a bobble hat !

In my case, a) I don't really care about ( actually, thats completely not true, I waited til more people had them, jumped on the bandwagon and then bought a 'cool' silver one ! Very Happy

). b) this is no longer a problem for me, as I am forced down the neat cropped hair route ! Crying or Very sad

and c) ok, it could be a beanie or a baseball cap or whatever !

If you don't want to wear one, then don't - if you do then do...

It is clear that helmets will become more and more 'popular' on the slopes in the same way that they are on bikes. I don't beleive they should be mandated, just as I don't beleive they should be on bikes ( pedal bikes that is ).

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

You'll need to Register first of course.

PG, sorry, couldn't locate the tounge-in-cheek smilie. wink

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

wasnt one of the original points of this thread that manufacturers of said helmets are activly promoting the 'safty' issue to their obvious financial advantage, when in fact there is no proven 'real' safety advantage .. judging by a lot of this thread so far they have been sucsessful in selling this to a lot of people.. never underestimate the global companys abilty to sell you stuff by preying on peoples dodgy risk assesment..

After all it is free

CANV CANVINGTON, this was a good thread, and referred to the Hagel study. In it I wrote:

The most recent Hagel study makes a point of stating that there is insufficient data to make a clear judgment on this (torque injury risk), as far as I understood its conclusions: "The effect of helmet use on neck injuries is less clear. Although we found no statistically significant estimates for neck injury and no evidence of effect modification by age, our sensitivity analysis suggests an increased risk of neck injuries with helmet use." This contrasts considerably with the far more categorical conclusion that "Wearing a helmet while skiing or snowboarding may reduce the risk of head injury by 29% to 56%—that is, for every 10 people who wear helmets, three to six may avoid head injuries. This may even be an underestimate if, as in cycling, the helmets were worn incorrectly or were in poor condition."

Hagel was also discussed here a little.

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

I've just bought my 1st helmet, for 2 reasons:

1. My kids wear one and asked why I didn't
2. I'm doing more off piste nearer and in between rocks
3. This happenned to a friend a few years back, he was very lucky and walked out of the hole, but look how close his head was to rock.

snow reports

kevinrhead, definitely. Our club and most others here in France insist on this. If you turn up at the start of a speed event, eg a superG, you won't be allowed to start with a slalom chin guard attached.

You know it makes sense.

Nick L,
The reason why I talk about death and use it statistically to compare driving and skiing is because it is a solid end point for which statistics are available and meaningful comparisons can be made. Personally I would expect a similar proportion of deaths to severe head injuries in the two activities as for trauma the two seem closely related, so I would expect the NNTT to be lower for driving than for skiing for severe head injury as well as death but I do not see the numbers to be sure.

PG, I have to say most ex-racers who I have skied with do not appear to wear helmets for free skiing in fact I think all but I would certainly concede I know far fewer than you.

The main problems with the Hagel study from my memory were as I pointed out earlier in the thread the measured end point may not be clinically significant with regard to head severe head injury, ie one with a poor neurological outcome. I would be surprisedd if there was no benefit I am sure helmets will offer some protection to those involved in a crash but the extent of the protection cannot be judged from rate of transfer to hospital.
On ski injuries it is reported that in the last five years I think there has not been a single case of adverse neurological outcome in any snow user, from the Scottish centres studied

The other problem is that there was no measure of the numbers at risk so we cannot see if there may have been a risk compensation effect.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

T Bar, I wasn't really thinking of high speed, full on impact situations, the likes of hitting a tree head first, flat out. More the likes of my accident, a heavy but glancing blow on exposed rock at probably no more that 15 mph, enough to crack the helmet but leave me without so much as a headache. Or at least I can't remember a headache, my shoulder was hurting too much wink

...

But as you say, the study was rather limited and inconclusive in certain key areas.

A snowHead

PG,
I'm very happy you were wearing a lid in spite of my own reluctance to wear one. snowHead

A snowHead

Of course the only way well know if helmets make any difference is for every skier to wear one. Then over the next few years well have some data that might show the benefit or not.

This may not answer the question though as the types of recreation happening in winter sports keeps changing.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I've got a skateboarding helmet - for my skateboarding, but it will also do for skiing. It looks as 'cool' as helmets can get and it's a happy medium between a massive ski helmet and nothing.
Still, I gotta admit I don't wear one unless I'm at Castleford where they make me!

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Does anyone know of a something like a very thin beany that can be worn under a helmet? Specifically to cover the bare bit of forehead that get exceedingly cold when wearing helmet with sunglasses rather than goggles (I hate goggles - only wear them when I have to)

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

davehk, you could try a balaclava.

You'll need to Register first of course.

Yeah - tried that - but I don't need the ear, neck or face cover - that gets too hot! Might try cutting one up, but my guess is it would just unravel.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

davehk, http://www.buff.es/ I wear one under my cycle helmet toasty!

After all it is free

davehk, there's loads about, mainly for cycling. Try your local bike shop.

http://snowboards-for-sale.com/snowboard_helmets/balaclava/

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

davehk, Extremities do a very thin fleece hat, I've worn it under a climbing helmet a fair bit and it's also one of the best looking around IMHO. i'm wearing mine at this very moment as I've just come into a cold house.

Help!!

Helmets

snowHeads Forum Index >>> The Piste