Helmets reduce head injury odds by 69 per cent

The original research article was also discussed on a road.cc blog. Its methodological flaws are sufficiently serious enough to throw its validity into doubt. These I detail in the comments.

Summary:  lumping together studies accumulated over the years which were published to demonstrate that helmets have some protective effect results in a meta-study which reflects these individual findings.  coming up later... Dog Bites Man.

Don't leave home without one. I smacked my head on the garage door this am (as I was adjusting my Garmin settings) and if I hadn't been wearing a helmet I'm sure it would have fecking hurt. Will now make sure I wear it when accessing the car and the lawnmower as well as my bike - it would be foolhardy to do otherwise even if I had private health cover.

Meanwhile my gransdons in Oz aren't allowed on their bikes  or even their scooters without a helmet but its fine for them to climb up the 25 foot climbing frame in Freemantle without one. They've also got a garage door that doesn't fully open as well - can't believe they ignore these risks.

I've been hit by a car and my head bounced off the road... I'm glad I had a helmet on because that took the force of that impact, dissipated it and shattered as it was supposed to do.  I've got some nice pictures somewhere...

I can't believe that nobody has mentioned how much football costs the NHS.  I bet there's more football injuries in A&E then there are cyclists.

2p > talking about distance per accident is irrelevant, all of you are not having an accident right now. Talking about body trauma is irrelevant. Helmets have a very specific role; they mitigate injury, that is all, mitigate not prevent. Risk is a spectum, cycling is a mode of transport and a sport. Go slow, you should be fine, go faster and there is more risk, start thinking about protecting yourself. Get yourself stuck in the middle with delusions that your own skill will protect you and you are likely to run out of luck. 

Almost everyone seems to be missing the important point. If you should happen to have an accident and come off you bike which is admittedly is quite unlikely, then a helment may well save your life.
It's up to you if you want to wear one, but it keeps sun off head in summer and head warm in winter, so no downside for me.

Now despite the low odds of an accident per miles/km travelled. amongst all the riders here, I wonder how many can say they never, ever fallen off a bike? 
Anecdotally -  I've broken two helmets whilst wearing them. Once mountain biking when a rear shock failed and bike ground on rocks at high speed stopping rather suddenly, rocks which I then tumbled along with just a scratch and a graze, plus a cracked helmet and intact skull. Another time was after being attacked by idiot car drivers, again preventing serious injury.
I know numerous people who have escaped serious head injury due to helmet wearing and a death and permanent brain injury through not wearing one. Last two on road, the others off road.
 

No matter what, helmet debates are a red herring. Motoring industry and the mainstream media and politicians love it. Any time they need a diversionary tactic, mention helmets or high-vis and everyone loses focus of what's genuinely important - congestion, pollution, dangerous driving, energy, unsustainability, infrastructure, healthly living, etc.

Massive issues all of those, but no, lets argue endlessly about 200 grams of foam on cyclists' heads. 

Skaters fall daily, really harshly off rails, steps, acid drops, really horrible. No-one gives a toss because they're not part of a wider debate on transportation. This isn't about a love of your fellow citizen's welfare, it's an insidious distraction.

Don't get caught up in it. 

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I'm old and jaded and debating being arsed to google the paper myself.

I mean, would it be that hard to put a link to the paper in question, so we can see its methods ourselves? I can't see one.

Honestly as I bit of a skeptic I suspect they're right, but just agreeing without any review is Bad Science.

If you don't like helmets - you should hate claims uttered with insufficient proof.

If you like them - you should want the claims to stand up to scrutiny, which I suspect they do.  The interesting research should probably be more around "how hard do you have to hit before you're dead either way, how soft do you have to hit before you're fine either way"?

Oh, whatever.  I barely cycle anymore and helmets have been a big part of that - they do not make me feel safer, I will never be grateful for being hit by a twat in a car and maybe left alive by a piece of plastic I may be legally forced to wear.  Enjoy paying for my various obesity-related NHS costs, evangelists.

The Aussies live in a strange parallel world where cycling is so incredibly dangerous that you have to be fined squillions of  AUD just for breaking the rules on hats and bells. Frankly I don't trust them or their stats. Also, their competitive cyclists.. aren't.

I note that its not actually new research - its an aggregation of the results of all sorts of previous research.  So if any of that older research is a bit iffy (and I heard that some of it is) then it affects the resolutions of this.  I think its called "meta research".

It took a while to get going, but there's some ripe old shit get shovelled here now.

I believe they've made hitting people over the head with a plant illegal in holland, that's why they don't need helmets, there an inlighted lot those Dutch. 

“Helmet use is associated with odds reductions of ... 33% for face injury ..."

Helmets reduce face injuries by 33%? Really? That alone makes me very suspicious of their figures.

I am a helmet wearer, btw.

Anyone who claims wearing a helmet makes no difference, get someone to hit you round the head with a plank without one and then with, then post on here an let us know how it went. Geez.

The headline is "Helmets reduce head injury odds by 69 per cent".   But that isn't true.  The apparent evidence is that where there is a crash, then head injuries are so improved.  But the best way to avoid a head injury is to avoid a crash.  

So, lets have better driving and better facilities rather than relying on hats.

if helmets are so efficacious... they why aren't they mandatory for all occupants of motor vehicles?

Unless figures have changed recently, my understanding is that the Dutch experience a similar number of deaths and serious head injurues to UK cyclists. Instead of proecting themselves with polystyrene, they pass more effective laws and build proper infrastructure.

Interesting take on Durtch attitudes here http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2010/08/brain-injuries-and-dutch-cy...

I wear one most days. I know I can probably beat the odds not wearing but then you read something like this

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/miracle-cyclist-horror-crash-reveal...

I don't know why we need a study to know that helmet protects your head.  When you go MTB people uses kee and elbow protection for reason to protect themselves when crashing.  

Its no brainer to any person with common sense to know that if you have a a protective layer it will proect you from scraps and if it has cusioning (helmet has) then it also helps with impact injury. 

I fell off MTB on trail once and head straight onto a rock.  If it werent' for my helmet I will be in A&E for sure. 

The results of this study are only really usefull if the researchs could shed some light on how they calculated their conclusion.

Quote:

Cycle helmets are only designed to withstand collisions at speeds of 5.42-5.52m/s, or a little over 12mph.

i.e. designed to offer [some] protection from a falling hight of 1.5 meters.

Quote:

Researchers have advised caution in applying helmet safety data to population level, due to the effect of "risk compensation" and the possible effects of helmet laws in reducing cycling rates. The former is a hypothesis where helmet wearers exhibit greater risk-taking behaviour, while some motorists drive closer to helmeted cyclists, though Olivier and Creighton say there is "very little published research on the topic and no systematic review".

Perhaps I am being a little neive.. but searching for 'risk compensation cycle helmets papers' shows over 9000 results. Have not had time to read them all yet, but 'very little published research'??

I have an opinion.

"Researchers have advised caution in applying helmet safety data to population level"

My main concern is with using potentially unreliable stats to make laws. Today it's compulsory cycle helmets, tomorrow perhaps mandatory ID cards and subcutaneous microchips?

I wonder what results they'd get if they asked crash victims whether they wore a lucky charm.