Women Drivers!

Men are more likely than women to be injured or killed in traffic accidents. That’s probably because they drive more often and faster than women do.

However, if you compare outcomes per incident and at the same speed (not total outcomes by gender), a woman is 20-28% more likely than a man to be killed in a car crash, and 37-73% more likely to be injured. What causes this difference?

It is possibly because women tend to drive smaller, lighter weight cars than men do. Women are also more likely to be driving the vehicle that is hit during front-into-rear and side-impact crashes, where vehicle structures may not protect them as well.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) also notes that women are more likely than men to suffer leg injuries in car wrecks. Because of all these differences in accident statistics between the genders, IIHS is suggesting that crash test dummies better reflect the female body.

Here are the statistical reports:

• Vehicle choice, crash differences help explain greater injury risks for women - https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/vehicle-choice-crash-differences-help-explain-greater-injury-risks-for-women.
• Fatality Facts, 2020, Males and females - https://www.iihs.org/topics/fatality-statistics/detail/males-and-females.

Is Headbanging Music Bad for Your Health?

Man holding head in pain after banging head

The short answer is: probably.

But it’s not the music per se, it’s how you listen to it.

Head banging music may be rock, punk, or heavy metal, to which listeners swing their heads, often quite fast, along with the beat of the song.

Loud music can damage your hearing in many ways. It can damage or destroy the hair cells that allow us to detect sound. Damaged hair cells cause temporary hearing loss. After a loud concert you may need to have people speak loudly so you can hear them. You may have a sense of ringing in your ears. This goes away eventually, but repeated damage will cause hair cells to die, causing permanent hearing loss.

Loud noises can also damage the auditory nerve that carries messages from your ear to your brain, causing a hidden form of hearing loss. This damage makes it difficult to understand a single speaker in a noisy background environment. This hearing loss is also cumulative, increasing the risk of hearing loss as you age.

Recent research has shown that the rhythmic head motions that usually results from listening to this music genre can lead to moderate- to severe-level traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) over time. Each time one's head changes direction the brain gets whacked, not enough to cause a concussion, but there is injury. But the small injuries add up, eventually resulting in a TBI. The type of injury resulting from headbanging is similar to that of whiplash from a car accident, as both involve acceleration/deceleration motions with the brain bumping against the skull.

Be cautious how you treat your ears and your brain. You only get one set, and it has to last you all the rest of your life.

Learn to Edit Wikipedia Health and Medical Articles, May 10, 11am-1pm SLT

Wikipedia is a free comprehensive multilingual online encyclopedia that encourages everyone to participate in editing it. Writing the articles and maintaining the site are all done by volunteers. “Dr. Wikipeda” is consulted by over 500 million people worldwide each month for health and wellness topics.

The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) is hosting an online Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon on Tuesday, May 10, from 11am-1pm SLT (2-4pm Eastern). The webinar (hosted on the gotowebinar platform) will include:

• An introduction to Wikipedia
• How to edit Wikipedia articles
• How editing is monitored on Wikipedia to avoid bias and disinformation
• Practice editing articles about asthma (although this does not need to be your focus)
• Suggested next steps and ongoing support

You do not need to have any prior Wikipedia experience, nor do you need to have a specific interest in asthma to participate. Wikipedia chose this topic for their examples because May is Asthma Awareness Month.

If you have ever read a Wikipedia health, wellness, or disability article and wished your own viewpoint were better represented, this is the webinar for you.

Here’s where to register: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/765379262396289036.

Healthinfo Island Displays and Exhibits for May 2022

You can teleport to any of the eight displays and exhibits using the SLURLs in this notecard. Click on the poster with the same name as the title of the poster set, and you will get a notecard that contains all the text of the posters plus descriptions of the images. 

If you click each poster, you will get a message with additional information and live links.

Central Pavilion of Healthinfo Island

Check out the calming breathing exercise on the back wall!

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/128/126/24

Please note that all displays and exhibits this month correlate with the Mental Health 

Loneliness, Social Isolation and Mental Health

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/195/158/22

Counteracting Loneliness

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/188/181/24

Brain Injury

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/172/155/22

What Defines Community?

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/114/79/24

Why is Community Important for People with Disabilities?

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/98/40/26

Boost Your Resilience

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/50/28/28

Minority Mental Health Equity

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/24/23/30

How to Get Mental Health Help

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/21/63/32

 

Thanks to Anna and Mook for assistance with the posters this month.