Motorcycle Helmet Use: A No Brainer There is nothing like riding a motorcycle; the sights, sounds, smells, and the

wind in your hair. Well, not the wind in your hair if you are among those that question helmet use. There are some souls amongst the riding public that

believe wearing a helmet is uncomfortable, deprives the rider of essential information gathering inputs, and a few even believe that helmets are unsafe. While these reasons may be valid to them, I believe that helmet use is one of the smartest things one can do to ensure ones safety on a motorcycle, and in fortysix states in the union, its the law. Motorcycles, by their nature, do not afford the rider the kinds of safety enclosures that passengers in cars enjoy motorcycles dont have crumple zones. Donning a helmet is the paramount step one can take to ensure ones safety and continuing enjoyment of motorcycles. A great deal of time and money has been, and will continue to be spent on the study of helmet use as it pertains to rider safety and the burden on the population by un-helmeted riders involved in accidents that require treatment after exhausting their medical insurance coverage for the injuries sustained, or those that have no insurance at all. Harry Hurt conducted the definitive study on motorcycle accidents at USC in 1979. In his report, Motorcycle Accident Cause Factors and Identification of Countermeasures, his team studied 3622 accidents and drew many important conclusions relative to motorcycle safety. In the

summary of this report, Hurt brought attention to a great deal of information that had not been known or even considered up to that point. Among the items that pertain to the discussion at hand are the following;

Approximately 50% of the motorcycle riders in traffic were using safety helmets but only 40% of the accident-involved motorcycle riders were wearing helmets at the time of the accident.

Voluntary safety helmet use by those accident- involved motorcycle riders was lowest for untrained, uneducated, young motorcycle riders on hot days and short trips.

The use of the safety helmet is the single critical factor in the prevention of reduction of head injury; the safety helmet which complies with FMVSS 218 is a significantly effective injury countermeasure.

Safety helmet use caused no attenuation of critical traffic sounds, no limitation of pre-crash visual field, and no fatigue or loss of attention; no element of accident causation was related to helmet use.

Helmeted riders and passengers showed significantly lower head and neck injury for all types of injury, at all levels of injury severity.

There is no liability for neck injury by wearing a safety helmet; helmeted riders had less neck injuries than un-helmeted riders. Only four minor injuries were attributable to helmet use, and in each case the helmet prevented possible critical or fatal head injury.

The Hurt Report, as it is commonly referred, was conducted by a team of researchers over the course of a number of documented motorcycle accidents. Just considering it on those criteria, this report is one of the most valuable sources of accident data for the motorcycle industry as well as riders and instructors. A study conducted by the University of California San Francisco

published in the September 15, 1998 edition of The Journal of Trauma: Injury, Infection and Critical Care, stated: Total medical costs for motorcycle accident-related injuries were $35 million less in 1993 than 1991, a reduction of 35 percent. The total medical cost for motorcycle crash injuries dropped from about $98 million in 1991 to about $63 million in 1992 and 1993, the first two years of the helmet law. This study supports the idea that helmet use saves the general public a great deal of money. For me, the day-to-day motivation I have for wearing a helmet is comfort. The helmet protects me from an encyclopedic list of stimulus; wind, bugs, debris, rain, and cold. These are not mere irritants; these inputs place an even greater strain on the primary sensor array of the rider than just the act of controlling the motorcycle, so along with the other personal protective equipment that the rider should be wearing, the helmet provides the body with shelter from the environment and allows the rider to concentrate on riding. Where the helmet really shines, however, is when the rider is no longer upright on the motorcycle and finds him or herself impacting the ground with force and sliding along a section of the municipal roadway system. To understand how a helmet protects your brain, its important to understand just how fragile it actually is. The consistency of the human brain is like warm Jell-o. Essentially, your brain floats inside your skull in a tub of

cervical-spinal fluid and a protective membrane called the dura. When your skull

stops suddenly, as it does when it hits something hard, the brain keeps going. Then it has its own collision with the inside of the skull. If that collision is too severe, the brain can sustain any number of injuries, from shearing of the brain tissue to bleeding in the brain, or between the brain and the dura, or between the dura and the skull. And after your brain is injured, even more damage can occur. When the brain is bashed or injured internally, bleeding and inflammation make it swell. When your brain swells inside the skull, there's no place for that extra volume to go. So it presses harder against the inside of the skull and tries to squeeze through any opening, even forcing itself down the base of the skull. To combat this pressure buildup, doctors will remove a portion of the skull over the injury to give this swelling somewhere to go. At Military hospitals, there are wards full of service people who have sustained head injuries overseas with pieces of their skulls removed and their swollen brains exposed. While it is

probably uncommon to receive an injury on a motorcycle that is similar to an injury that one may incur while at war, the knowledge that wearing a motorcycle helmet will go a long way to preventing such a fate is comforting to me. A motorcycle helmet is comprised of two major components: the outer shell and the energy-absorbing inner liner. The inner lining is made of expanded polystyrene or EPS, the same material used in beer coolers and foam coffee cups. Outer shells come in two basic configurations: a resin/fiber composite, such as fiberglass, carbon fiber and Kevlar, or a molded thermoplastic such as ABS or polycarbonate. The shell is there for a number of reasons. First, it protects against penetrating trauma of the EPS, although that is rare occurrence

in a real accident. Second, the shell protects against abrasion, which is a good thing when you're sliding down Chuckanut Drive. Third, it gives helmet designers like Troy Lee a nice, smooth surface to paint dragons on. Riders and helmet marketers pay a lot of attention to the outer shell and its material. But the part of the helmet that absorbs most of the energy in a crash is actually the inner liner; when the helmet hits a hard surface like the road or a curb, the outer shell stops instantly. Inside, your head keeps going until it collides with the liner. When this happens, the liner's job is to bring the head to a gentle stop. The essential property of EPS is that as it crushes and absorbs lots of energy at a predictable rate preventing the brain from slapping the inside of the skull and being damaged. In my experience as a patient participant in the maxillofacial surgical community, I have come to understand a great deal about facial injuries. One of the more frightening results of blunt trauma to the face is mandibular dislocation, a condition in which one or both of the ball joints at the top of the lower jaw (mandible) become dislocated from their respective sockets in the skull. These injuries can range in severity from minor misalignment of the jaw that can be remedied by hand in the emergency room, to severe fractures of the skull itself that can potentially damage the brain. Chinbars on full face helmets can be instrumental in reducing the severity of facial trauma in a motorcycle accident. The gamut of gory possibilities aside, at the very least I am a big fan of keeping my skin on, and the road off of my face; or any other part of my body for that matter. Often I have mentioned that I am comforted to know that the equipment I

wear protects me from the elements and will truly be appreciated when I am forcefully removed from the bike. Comfort and protection has always provided a sense of well being and calm to humans throughout history, allowing them to get on with the job of survival. So it is for motorcyclists, too. Being able to

concentrate on the job of riding the motorcycle without the distraction of the millionth piece of dirt, or bug, or raindrop is a prime factor in accident avoidance, hopefully making all of this discussion of injury and medical costs moot. Even if mandatory helmet use laws did not exist, donning a helmet would still be the paramount step that a rider could take to ensure his or her safety and continuing enjoyment of motorcycles. The evidence that suggests helmet use decreases the severity of some kinds of motorcycle accident related injuries, and eases the financial burden of the general public of which the motorcyclist is a member should be motivation enough. But sometimes an appeal to a riders personal sensibilities is necessary. Do you really want to think about how the small act of wearing a helmet could have saved you when your food is unceremoniously flung in front of you every day by the minimum wage slave at the nursing home? Me either.

Works Cited "California Motorcycle Helmet Law Saves Money, UCSF Study Shows." USCF Daybreak News. 03 Feb. 2007 <http://www.ucsf.edu/daybreak/1998/09/16_helm.html>.

Ford, Dexter. "Motorcycle Helmet Performance: Blowing the Lid Off." Motorcyclist. 02 Feb. 2007 <http://www.motorcyclistonline.com/gearbox/motorcycle_helmet_review/index.ht ml>. Hurt, H.h, J.v. Ouellet, and D.r. Thom. Motorcycle Accident Cause Factors and Identification of Countermeasures. Traffic Safety Center, University of Southern California. Springfield, Virginia: National Technical Information Service, 1981. 02 Feb. 2007. Works Consulted Muska, D. Dowd. "Helmet Laws: Heading Off Personal Freedom." The Nevada Policy Research Institute. 02 Feb. 2007 <http://www.npri.org/issues/issues98/i_b070498.htm>. Nader, Ralph. "Letter to Governor Granholm on Motorcycle Helmet Law." 19 June 2006. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Motorcycle Helmet Use Laws. Sanfelipo, Tony. "Cruel Hoax Played on American Public Concerning Helmets." United States Freedom Fighter. 02 Feb. 2007 <http://usff.com/hldl/hoax/pan196.html>. State Motorcycle Equipment Requirements. Motorcycle Industry Council.