Think Twice Before Ditching your Bike Helmet
Written by Aditi Mahajan
Edited by Vicky Diep
February 9th, 2023
Edited by Vicky Diep
February 9th, 2023
Public Health
Most people know that it is important to wear a helmet when you are biking. Wearing your helmet is like wearing your seatbelt; it serves as a protective measure. However, many people do not wear helmets when they bike because they do not understand the consequences of not wearing a helmet. In a study with over 100 teenage participants, only 14% of teenagers wore a helmet while biking (Axelsson & Stigson, 2019). What are the consequences of this?
Researchers at the American College of Surgeons, in the Marin Medical Center of California wanted to delve deep into this question and compare the health consequences of not wearing a helmet to wearing a helmet in bike accidents. In their study, the researchers at the Marin Medical Center assessed 906 bike-injury patients in their Trauma Registry (Alfrey et al., 2021). Out of those injured, 701 patients wore helmets whereas 205 patients did not (Alfrey et al., 2021). They also found the average time that the helmeted patients spent at the hospital following a bike injury was 2.6 days, whereas the average time that non-helmeted patients spent in the hospital was 3.1 days (Alfrey et al., 2021). This means that if you do not wear a helmet and get involved in a bike crash, you run the risk of spending a longer time recovering in a hospital. This may mean losing time spent working or being with family.
The researchers at Marin also made the surprising finding that less than a quarter of the people involved in bike-related injuries were reported to have worn helmets while biking (Alfrey et al., 2021). They found that those who wore helmets had less than a percent of a chance of a major head injury compared to nearly 4% of people who did not wear helmets (Alfrey et al., 2021). The most common injuries seen across all the bike related injuries were concussions. Symptoms of concussions include memory loss, headaches, dizziness, nausea, and vomiting (Alfrey et al., 2021). According to Alfrey and his team, a person is considered concussed if they exhibit one or more of these symptoms after trauma to the head . Some other common bike-related injuries were found to be facial fractures, rib fractures, and clavicle fractures (Alfrey et al., 2021). Even though the rates of concussions were found to be similar among the helmet wearers and non-helmet wearers, the non-helmet wearers suffered more severe injuries in total. Helmeted bike riders also had significantly fewer facial fractures, skull fractures, and other serious head injuries. People who wore helmets were found to be less likely to suffer from long-term head injuries (Alfrey et al., 2021).
The researchers at Marin Medical Center plan to conduct an additional study evaluating the long term effects of the injuries sustained by those involved in bicycle crashes. This may affect the findings of the benefits of wearing helmets compared to not wearing helmets. However, the researchers still strongly recommend that bicycle riders wear helmets to avoid serious injuries. The next time you decide to go for a bike ride, and want to ditch your helmet, remember the costs!