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Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
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Prevention
By Mayo Clinic staffThe following tips may help you to prevent or minimize your risk of head injury:
- Wear a helmet during recreational activities. When bicycling, motorcycling, skiing, horseback riding, skating or engaging in any recreational activity that may result in head injury, wear protective headgear.
- Buckle your seat belt. Wearing a seat belt may prevent serious injury, including an injury to your head, during a traffic accident.
- Make your home fallproof. Keep your home well lit and your floors free of clutter — meaning anything that might cause you to trip and fall. Falls around the home are the leading cause of head injury for infants, toddlers and older adults.
- Protect your children. To help lessen the risk of head injuries to your children, pad countertops and edges of tables, block off stairways and install window guards. Don't let your child use sporting equipment or play sports that aren't suitable for their age.
- Use caution in and around swimming areas. Don't dive into water less than 9 feet (3 meters) deep. Read and follow posted safety rules at water parks and swimming pools.
- Wear sensible shoes. If you're older, wear thinner, hard-soled, flat shoes. Resilient-soled athletic shoes may impair your balance and contribute to falls. Avoid wearing high heels, sandals with light straps, or shoes that are either too slippery or too sticky.
References
- Minor head injury. American Academy of Pediatrics. http://www.aap.org/publiced/BR_HeadInjury.htm. Accessed Feb. 12, 2009.
- Heegaard WG, et al. System injuries. In: Marx JA, et al., eds. Marx: Rosen's Emergency Medicine: Concepts and Clinical Practice. 6th ed. St. Louis, Mo.: Mosby; 2006:349.
- Concussion. http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec06/ch087/ch087c.html. Accessed Jan. 15, 2009.
- Evans RW. Concussion and mild traumatic brain injury. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 15, 2009.
- Living with brain injury. Brain Injury Association of America. http://www.biausa.org/education.htm#concussion. Accessed Feb. 15, 2009.
- Evans RW, et al. Traumatic disorders. In: Goetz GD. Textbook of Clinical Neurology. 3rd ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: W.B. Saunders; 2007:1185.
- Concussion. American Association of Neurological Surgeons. http://www.neurosurgerytoday.org/what/patient_e/concussion.asp. Accessed Jan. 15, 2009.
- DePompolo RW (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. Feb. 3, 2009.
