EVALUATION OF HOCKEY HELMET PERFORMANCE BY FINITE ELEMENT MODELING

Since the advent of helmet use in ice hockey the incidence of traumatic brain injury (TBI) has decreased, however the prevalence of mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) has not (Wennberg and Tator, 2003). Recently finite element modeling (FEM) has been used in an attempt to identify mTBI thresholds from an impact using shear stress strain (SSS) and other parameters to aid in reducing these injuries (Zhang et al., 2004). The following study employs the University College Dublin Brain Trauma Model (UCDBTM) to evaluate the ability of vinyl nitrile (VN) and expanded polypropolene (EPP) hockey helmets to reduce the risk of brain injury.