Differences in head injuries of pedal cyclist and motorcyclist casualties in Victoria.

There being no legal requirement in Victoria for pedal cyclists to wear crash helmets (and only few do so), we tested the hypothesis that pedal cyclists are subject to significantly greater risk of head injury than motorcyclists, who are required by law to wear them. Injury data of 1975 to 1980 showed that there were three times more fatalities and reported non-fatal casualities among motorcyclists than among pedal cyclists. Head injuries, including fractured vault of skull, fractured base of skull, concussion and intracranial injury, were significantly more frequent among pedal cyclist casualties (P less than 0.001). The number of pedal cyclist casualties with solely head injury was twice that of motorcycle riders, and those pedal cyclist casualties had a significantly greater incidence of fractured vault of the skull. It is likely that risk of head injury for pedal cyclists would be significantly reduced if they wore protective helmets.