HEAD IMPACTS IN ICE HOCKEY
Head impacts in ice hockey are a serious problem. In Canada, over 40% of concussions related to team sports occur from ice hockey. There is also growing evidence that repetitive impacts to the head, even at sub-concussive levels, have serious consequences for brain health.
Our goal is to generate evidence for improved approaches to reduce the frequency and consequences of head impacts in ice hockey. We address this goal by identifying the most common scenarios for head impacts in ice hockey, analyzing the dynamics of those events, and determining how interventions, such as modifications to protective padding and the rink environment, can reduce the severity and clinical consequences of head impacts in hockey.
DYNAMICS OF HEAD COLLISIONS IN ICE HOCKEY
Improvements in prevention require understanding how head impacts occur in ice hockey, and the factors that influence impact severity. Since 2014, we have partnered with the SFU Men’s Ice Hockey team to collect and analyze video footage of head impacts, and to measure the acceleration experienced by the head during impact events from helmet-mounted sensors. Our findings have relevance to improvements in rule of play, player training, protective gear design, and environmental design. Our “on-ice” results also inform of the design of “off-ice” experiments on the cause and prevention of head impacts and injuries.
INTERVENTIONS TO PROTECT THE BRAIN
Laboratory experiments provide a controlled setting for acquiring high-resolution measures of head accelerations during common impact scenarios in ice hockey. Lab experiments also allow us to examine the effect of interventions in reducing head impact severity. In one line of research, players delivered checks to an instrumented dummy, to compare the magnitude and duration of linear and rotational accelerations for impacts delivered by the hand, elbow or shoulder. Extending these efforts, we examined how changes to the stiffness of shoulder pads influence the severity of shoulder-to-head impacts. Through additional experiments and mathematical models, we are examining the protective benefit of modifications to the stiffness and mass of the glass shielding - a common site for head impact.
Vakili O, Aguiar OMG, Robinovitch SN: Effects of shielding stiffness and mass on head impact accelerations in ice hockey. Northwest Biomechanics Symposium 2021, Willamette University, Salem OR, July 15, 2021
