Brain(hulk?) surgeon: There's no point wearing bicycle helmets

[JulesMaximus]

Of course not. Always factor in the amount of carbon fiber and the size of the seat bag.

I don't know how I always end up looking like a judgmental asshole in these threads. It's not fair.

:biggrin: You're just misunderstood right?

 

[rh71]

There is a part of me who is right with you. Especially since my baby brother who is 19 years younger than I is not allowed to ride his bike on my moms property (she lives on a few acres) without a helmet when I remember being a kid and riding all over town and doing countless stupid things outside of adult supervision and without a helmet.

All these "when I was your age..." lines... I rode on the streets with friends without a helmet. There weren't as many driver-distractions as there are today. I rode in the front seat of my dad's Firebird when I was a child too. Would I have been safer riding in the back seat than directly facing the dash board & glass? YES.

 

[_Rick_]

The styrofoam hat helmets are only good for small impacts. Think more along the lines of a small child riding down the sidewalk and crashing over into the grass. Their head bumps into a rock. For a small impact like that, the foam does cushion the impact from the rock into their head. Or maybe they fall backwards into the sidewalk. It does add a minor level of protection.

It doesn't add any serious protection and anyone that thinks it does is looney as hell.

Physics. You don't understand them.

Most helmets work best at around 15-20mph impact speed.
They crush (which softens the blow, both to the brain, and the vertebrae) and they spread out the force (which makes it easier for the skull to absorb the force without cracking open).

What you're saying, is that a motor cycle helmet is useless above 10 mph, because if you hit something at that speed with a helmet, you'll be feeling the pain.

Both road bikers, with their head-forwards position, and uprighters, who fall from greater heights, benefit from helmets in most crash situations, if they were a properly fitted helmet. There is a slight risk of picking up a neck injury, which is what's being debated in the OP, but there's comparatively little anecdotal evidence of this, compared to that of people hitting objects head first.

 

[Imp]

Physics. You don't understand them.

Most helmets work best at around 15-20mph impact speed.
They crush (which softens the blow, both to the brain, and the vertebrae) and they spread out the force (which makes it easier for the skull to absorb the force without cracking open).

IIRC, motorcycle helmets are mainly designed for protecting against someone falling off his/her bike and impacting the pavement -- a glancing or straight down blow on the ground. It's not really meant to protect you hitting something head on.

For $20, I'll stick to having a helmet just to give my head a bit more of a chance.

 

[Howard]

First, let's understand that I'm not saying that helmets are useless, but in health related subjects studies are far too often latched onto as dogma and one questions at the risk of being labeled a heretic. This gives a fair explanation.

The study which is the one most often cited as a rationale for mandates is one which was based on correlation, not causation, and claimed an 85% reduction in injury. Well it was awfully done and could not be reproduced. That stopped no from quoting it as gospel. Can helmets reduce some kinds of injury? Sure. That's why I wear one, but bad science is no justification. It's tantamount to religious convictions. What studies have looked at causal events and weighed them against negative outcomes? What does prudent, contextual and comprehensive examination of the consequences of helmet use say? I don't believe this has been done with the due diligence required by unbiased researchers to give definite answers. To restate myself, I believe it is prudent to wear head protection, but I object to the reliance on shoddy work as justification.

Your reference notes that the study which is typically used by proponents of helmet-wearing was from 1989 (or whatever) and hasn't been replicated. However, DrPizza gave four studies, all unique, three of which came after 1989. All conclude that helmets offer a significant deal of protection against head injuries.

Moreover, you haven't shown that any of these studies use bad science.

 

[bradley]

This is a job for Mythbusters! Someone get Jamie and Adam on this one, stat!

BTW, this one was a shocker to me.
http://stcommunities.straitstimes.c...een-mythbusters-jamie-hyneman-and-adam-savage

 

[lozina]

They should just ban falling

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Your reference notes that the study which is typically used by proponents of helmet-wearing was from 1989 (or whatever) and hasn't been replicated. However, DrPizza gave four studies, all unique, three of which came after 1989. All conclude that helmets offer a significant deal of protection against head injuries.

Moreover, you haven't shown that any of these studies use bad science.

The first study published in the NEJM is the culprit and it is indeed awful. Note that it's statistics are no longer mentioned by the CDC although they were widely drawn upon. It's hardly surprising considering it is poorly constructed. They attempted to state causation based on correlation. The sin was projecting figures based on this.

Here's a story that's often been used to illustrate the pitfalls of such analysis

There was a scientist who put a frog on a table and banged his fist next to it. The frog obviously responded by jumping. Next he removed a limb, and although it didn't get as far it still responded to stimulus. He removed a second and a third and repeated the banging. Each time it responded. Finally he snipped off the last appendage and slapped the table and the frog didn't move.

The concluding statement made in his analysis of the experiment was- "Removing limbs of a frog caused a decrease in it's hearing. Upon removing the fourth limb the frog became completely deaf."

Now that may sound silly, but it's demonstrating the point by it's absurdity. Observation recorded results which could be accounted for by just this explanation. Correlation was made into causation and since variables aren't even analyzed the study is dead and cannot be reproduced. It's worse than useless, but the CDC and others relied upon it to shape policy and law because it just seems right. That's bad science leading to bad policy. I haven't had a chance to read the other papers in detail so I can't comment on their design. I also never once (and have stated the opposite) said that wearing a helmet was a bad idea. I have issues with how things are quantified. I have issues on policy and law based on faulty analysis. I have issues with policy and law based on a set of assumptions but takes no consideration whatsoever as to potential negatives of mandates. There are some, but how well they are analyzed is also something I have not carefully examined. Do you know what they are? How do you address them so you maximize benefit while minimizing pitfalls? What mechanism is in place to enable accurate quantization and analysis of data in an ongoing way? There happens to be one by the way.

Bottom line- anyone can toss out studies, but their objective value and relevance isn't so easily understood. It's never ever that easy.

So did I just say don't wear a helmet? No I didn't, so please don't try to make that attribution.

This sort of thing comes up all the time by the way. People take some fact, some figure, some statement and completely run with it. There's a scientist who's name escapes me at the moment and was instrumental in linking serum cholesterol to coronary artery disease and did so convincingly. Some time after this he went a function where physicians were standing around saying how bad dietary cholesterol was and how it was proven that it was the culprit. Our scientist began to explain that wasn't what was said then was immediately set upon by many in the group as being ignorant of the landmark research that he himself conducted. Of course they didn't recognize him so they shot off their mouths because "studies showed"... nothing. His research was about serum cholesterol, what is measured in tests and that is completely different from eating shrimp and eggs. Of course he was wrong. Everyone was glad to tell him precisely what he said, although he didn't. There be dragons.

 

[Capt Caveman]

The styrofoam hat helmets are only good for small impacts. Think more along the lines of a small child riding down the sidewalk and crashing over into the grass. Their head bumps into a rock. For a small impact like that, the foam does cushion the impact from the rock into their head. Or maybe they fall backwards into the sidewalk. It does add a minor level of protection.

It doesn't add any serious protection and anyone that thinks it does is looney as hell.

Not sure if serious.

 

[highland145]

BTW, this one was a shocker to me.
http://stcommunities.straitstimes.c...een-mythbusters-jamie-hyneman-and-adam-savage

One thing that Hyneman has learnt...

 

[Muse]

They should just ban falling

That's pretty much my strategy, it seems to be working. Of course, the ban was instituted by who? Me.

 

[Fritzo]

Physics lesson: it's not the speed on the bike that causes the injury to the head, unless the rider skids into a curb. The cranial injury is from the impact, which is mostly dependent upon the height from which the head drops to the pavement. Forward speed determines the amount of road rash for the most part. Little kids fall the most.



I know each individual case is just anecdotal; but I had a similar one. Except, at the time, I had the pedals with straps, rather than clip ins. Somehow, I managed to snap my chain under extreme acceleration (showing off, putting 100% into sprinting). I was probably up to about 30-35 mph at the moment of the accident, and was just passing all the people outside at the kids birthday party we had been at. I went over the handlebars, but the bike followed me, since I was attached. Witnesses said I did 3 complete cartwheels down the road. My kneecap was perpendicular to my leg, I possibly suffered a broken clavicle (that's about the only thing that wasn't x-rayed, but it took months before it wasn't in pain), broke a pedal off the bike & the straps from the opposite side, pile drove my kid's bike seat into the ground (thankfully, no kid), and split my helmet in two from one of the impacts. I was pretty hurt, but thankfully, my head was intact thanks to the helmet. People don't realize - the helmet works by breaking; that's how it absorbs the impact. If you've struck your helmet against the ground, throw it out and buy a new one. It's done its job.

Why does the most embarrassing stuff always happen in front of the most people?

 

[Fritzo]

Bottom line- anyone can toss out studies, but their objective value and relevance isn't so easily understood. It's never ever that easy.

I have a large background in science, and there is nothing that upsets me more than the news reporting a study as a fact.

A study means a trend was noticed. Often the trend is very slight, and the study group is relatively small. The purpose of a study is find areas that require further research.

The media LOVES to sensationalize studies for their shock value, and people actually base things like health care, finances, and other important aspects of their life on them. That really needs to stop.

The people here are usually smart enough to know the difference between a study and a fact, but people like my mother-in-law who are downing $50 worth of ginkgo biloba and other crap to keep healthy and sharp drive me crazy.

 

[brainhulk]

I have a large background in science, and there is nothing that upsets me more than the news reporting a study as a fact.

A study means a trend was noticed. Often the trend is very slight, and the study group is relatively small. The purpose of a study is find areas that require further research.

The media LOVES to sensationalize studies for their shock value, and people actually base things like health care, finances, and other important aspects of their life on them. That really needs to stop.

The people here are usually smart enough to know the difference between a study and a fact, but people like my mother-in-law who are downing $50 worth of ginkgo biloba and other crap to keep healthy and sharp drive me crazy.

What is fact? Something we know to be undeniably true? On what basis? Before scientific studies, it was called blind faith and hocus pocus. Science tore hocus pocus a new asshole and obliterated the magic. Unfortunately science is all we have to base fact on. Unfortunately the evidence is always changing. What you and I take for fact now may be obliterated and considered false as more evidence is gathered in the future. I don't think one can separate fact from studies

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

What is fact? Something we know to be undeniably true? On what basis? Before scientific studies, it was called blind faith and hocus pocus. Science tore hocus pocus a new asshole and obliterated the magic. Unfortunately science is all we have to base fact on. Unfortunately the evidence is always changing. What you and I take for fact now may be obliterated and considered false as more evidence is gathered in the future. I don't think one can separate fact from studies

You are missing the point. That a study is done does not make it scientifically valid. If it is scientifically valid it does not mean that it is contextually relevant. My story about the frog experiment could be done as a study on a million frogs with 100% repeatability. It was correctly recorded. The results were complete crap. Your "magic" is as relevant as pizza is to fortnights.

Edit-
You also don't seem to understand the difference between truth, facts and studies. Before studies there were were facts and truths. You don't need a formal system to observe cause and effect. You drop a ball and it falls to the ground. You have observed a fact which leads to a more general truth that objects fall when released. Studies however do not automatically provide facts or truths. They can, but they do not have to. Now you just made a claim based on your faith about the validity of studies. You are ascribing magical properties of correctness. "Science tore hocus pocus a new asshole and obliterated the magic" has nothing whatsoever to do with the subject at hand. Bad studies which are believed *is* hocus pocus.

 

[ajskydiver]

Physics lesson: <snip> The cranial injury is from the impact, which is mostly dependent upon the height from which the head drops to the pavement.

The AT collective and most people in general do not understand this or what it means or simply ignore it.

The helmet is designed to protect the head from hitting the ground from the fall -- whether that's a 4-6 feet or more off the ground.

Speed is irrelevant.

Falling off a barstool or in the bathroom (lots of hard objects) is comparable and speed isn't a factor. Falling from a standing position and hitting your head on something hard like cement, concrete, tile floors, etc. can and does kill a lot of people. Sitting on a motorcycle or bicycle, where your head may be a little lower or higher than you're own standing height, and having your head smack on the ground is what a helmet is protecting you against. That's it.

Making an argument against helmet effectiveness for any other situation is a fallacy.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Making an argument against helmet effectiveness for any other situation is a fallacy.

Pizza is correct in what he says as are you however when health concerns are involved you can't responsibly isolate one aspect of a thing and ignore consequences. I state categorically that helmets protect the head. Now suppose one mandates helmet use nationwide. Sounds good. Let's say ridership drops by about half and the exercise isn't made up by other forms of exercise and so that results in increased morbidity and mortality which exceeds the difference in injury rates before and after the laws were passed.

The helmet protects the head, but overall more people are harmed and die. From a health care policy perspective in this scenario which is better, to mandate or not?

 

[HumblePie]

Physics. You don't understand them.

Most helmets work best at around 15-20mph impact speed.
They crush (which softens the blow, both to the brain, and the vertebrae) and they spread out the force (which makes it easier for the skull to absorb the force without cracking open).

What you're saying, is that a motor cycle helmet is useless above 10 mph, because if you hit something at that speed with a helmet, you'll be feeling the pain.

Both road bikers, with their head-forwards position, and uprighters, who fall from greater heights, benefit from helmets in most crash situations, if they were a properly fitted helmet. There is a slight risk of picking up a neck injury, which is what's being debated in the OP, but there's comparatively little anecdotal evidence of this, compared to that of people hitting objects head first.

Oh I quite do. First off, regular bike helmets only cover the top of the head. They do add protection to that area. Not everyone lands on top of their head when they fall. They are a small cushion, but since the surface area is smaller than a full size helmet, the force has let dispersal area. They aren't very robust in design, and will crack easily with hard impacts.

The point being is that if you are a biker wearing a styrofoam half helm hat, it is good protection if you fall off you bike riding at normal~ish speeds and happen to land at an angle that makes good use of the impact surface area of the helmet.

If you are hit by a car and thrown off your bike at high velocity and land on your head, those styrofoam helmets will do nothing. If you are doing trick jumps and such, those helmets will do nothing if you fall from a height that generates too much force for those helmets to disperse properly.

Physics I understand, you don't seem to if you think styrofoam helmets are all that great. The speeds at which they help the most can be mitigated by proper user control and body rolling to prevent the head from being impacted by anything. At speeds where the rider can't adjust to minimize impact to their head, the styrofoam hats will do little to diffuse the force of those impacts. Especially as they are going to be prone to slide around the top of the head in the first place at those forces.


I said nothing about actual motorcycle helmets. I was talking about the little styrofoam helmets bicycle riders wear. Like this:

For some reason many idiots out there think this is going to protect them from more than a slip while they are at slow speeds or stopped and bang their head on the ground when the fall. It does wonders for kids, but adults I just laugh at them. If you fall at slow speeds or from not moving and hit your hard enough to require the protection a styrofoam hat like this provides, you are doing it wrong and probably shouldn't walking around outdoors without help.

 

[_Rick_]

Well, even then there are different models. A decent helmet has a plastic shell into which the styrofoam is molded, which will give the helmet better structural integrity.
And landing even on a bad helmet is better than landing with no helmet. Which is why I doubted your understanding of physics.
They may not do much (just look at Schumachers incident - without a helmet he would most likely be dead now, but even with, he's nothing but a vergetable), but what they do might just be enough to save your skull or brain.

And as a cyclist, there is a certain propensity to crash head-first into things, if you hit an obstacle. Going through the windscreen of a car is probably much safer with a helmet, than without.

Helmets will never do nothing, they will always do something, sometimes it's just not sufficient to save the skull or brain.

 

[DrPizza]

Pizza is correct in what he says as are you however when health concerns are involved you can't responsibly isolate one aspect of a thing and ignore consequences. I state categorically that helmets protect the head. Now suppose one mandates helmet use nationwide. Sounds good. Let's say ridership drops by about half and the exercise isn't made up by other forms of exercise and so that results in increased morbidity and mortality which exceeds the difference in injury rates before and after the laws were passed.

The helmet protects the head, but overall more people are harmed and die. From a health care policy perspective in this scenario which is better, to mandate or not?

You still haven't addressed the other studies I linked to. They studied actual emergency room records. AND, they adjusted for things like age, type of biking, etc. Furthermore, your frog analogy is incredibly flawed in that there is absolutely no mechanism that would explain why the frog without limbs couldn't hear. There is a fairly well understood, and measureable mechanism that would explain how a helmet protects a head.

Though, I guess you did state that you see that helmets protect heads. So, I guess we agree. But the rest, to me, seems to be a bit of ridiculous conjecture. We could make the same types of conjectures about seatbelts. "They don't necessarily save lives, because maybe people don't drive as much any more, and that results in..." While that conjecture might be true, I think it's fairly easily dismissed with a study of miles driven. The stats aren't as readily available, but it appears there hasn't been a sudden significant decrease in bicycle sales.

 

[Fritzo]

What is fact? Something we know to be undeniably true? On what basis? Before scientific studies, it was called blind faith and hocus pocus. Science tore hocus pocus a new asshole and obliterated the magic. Unfortunately science is all we have to base fact on. Unfortunately the evidence is always changing. What you and I take for fact now may be obliterated and considered false as more evidence is gathered in the future. I don't think one can separate fact from studies

For scientists, nothing is 100% true, so in effect the word "fact" doesn't exist. A scientific thought process is "this situation has proven true in every known way of testing it, and therefore the odds of it being true are higher than anything else."

So, a fact is essentially the most likely truth. Before something gets called a fact by the scientific community, it is shared with the entire world with the challenge "I WANT YOU TO BREAK THIS!" If nobody can disprove the information, it gets written into the books.

We used to be a lot more arrogant about facts, and that's why we used to have things like "The Law of Gravity" or "The Law of Physical Mechanics". Calling a proven information set a law has fallen out of favor because we've found there is always an exception. We now stop short of calling principles "laws" to allow them to be changed in the future.

A theory is what gets scientists into a lot of trouble in the public eye, because many times the lay person doesn't understand what "theory" means. They think of the classical "a theory is a guess". That's not the case- a theory is a peer reviewed and meticulously tested principal that has stood up to everything thrown at it. When many people hear "theory", the proper term they should be thinking is "hypothesis"- or an educated guess.

 

[HumblePie]

Well, even then there are different models. A decent helmet has a plastic shell into which the styrofoam is molded, which will give the helmet better structural integrity.
And landing even on a bad helmet is better than landing with no helmet. Which is why I doubted your understanding of physics.
They may not do much (just look at Schumachers incident - without a helmet he would most likely be dead now, but even with, he's nothing but a vergetable), but what they do might just be enough to save your skull or brain.

And as a cyclist, there is a certain propensity to crash head-first into things, if you hit an obstacle. Going through the windscreen of a car is probably much safer with a helmet, than without.

Helmets will never do nothing, they will always do something, sometimes it's just not sufficient to save the skull or brain.

Most bike riders do two things, if they have the time to react, when they plunge face forward due to a sudden stop. They either tuck their heads in and try to land on their shoulders, or look up while splaying outward. Tucking in saves a bunch of impact that would occur on the head. Looking up doesn't. Looking up is going to make someone land face first instead. A styrofoam hat isn't going to protect anyone that lands on their face or chin which is the most common form of falling that occurs on a bicycle where the rider is thrown forward from a sudden stop. Most people's initial reaction is also to "splay" outward, which usually prevents the rider from being thrown into a tumble when toss forward. Which makes the likelyhood of landing on your head where a helmet might be used less likely.

Those that tuck in and go for a "roll" or "tumble" don't put any impact on their head. They tend to land on their shoulders and upper arms if they are doing it right. Which means no helmet is needed. They may break a clavicle, but I'd rather have a broke clavicle than a broken skull.

Yes there is some flimsy plastic the styrofoam is molded into. It adds some rigidity, but really not enough to protect from shit. Any force dangerous enough to cause severe damage when thrown from a bicycle to cause serious harm, that plastic is going to crack, separate the foam, and allow the head underneath to absorb the rest of the impact. Falls where serious harm is less likely an outcome, due to less force from the fall, the rider can easily mitigate any head trauma with proper falling reflexes and training. At which point the sytrofoam hat exists to cause less road rash to the top of your head than any real protection. Granted, I don't like getting abrasions on my head, but no one is going to die or be seriously injured from some minor abrasions.

Point I am making is those silly styrofoam hats are dubious for protection at best for your head. If you are worried about head protection wear a real helmet.


http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1068.html

Read that. Basically talks about how for much of what the government had stated based on a really bad study was removed due to in-defensibility. And then you have ridiculous studies like measuring possible reduced injury amounts from helmet laws being enacted don't actually show that result.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...6532b4-c6df-11e2-9245-773c0123c027_story.html

When it comes to helmets, if you need one then go big or go home.

 

[highland145]

Humble, you're full of it. Just saying.

 

[HumblePie]

Lol, how is a little bit of styrofoam on the top of your head going to protect a rider that falls and doesn't land on the top of their head? In fact, in many cases it can cause more injury because the wider brim of the helmet may actually make someone's head come into contact with the ground because they can no longer fall "correctly" with a tuck and roll scenario.

You have no clue if you think think those styrofoam hats do anything to actually prevent injury or death. Again, more for you to read with studies included

http://bicyclesafe.com/helmets.html

 

[MongGrel]

http://www.cnet.com/news/brain-surgeon-theres-no-point-wearing-cycle-helmets/



I think I'll keep my helmet on thank you.

I think Oberyn needed one of those :biggrin: