Face Mask Removal in Newly-Designed Football Helmets

Context: Newly-designed football face mask (FM) attachment systems may impact the effectiveness of emergency FM removal by athletic trainers. Objective: To compare the effectiveness of FM removal on newly-designed and traditional football helmets. Design: Repeated measures. Setting: Controlled laboratory. Participants: Twenty-five subjects (13 male, 12 female, age=31.79±10.14) were recruited from among local certified athletic trainers (9.24±7.18 years certified). Subjects were free from significant upper extremity or central nervous system injury and provided informed consent. Interventions: Subjects removed FMs from 3 styles of helmets in two conditions (unaltered hardware, altered hardware). The approach to FM removal varied according to helmet style with subjects using the combined-tool technique (screwdriver first, cutting tool as necessary) for Traditional and Riddell Quick Release (QR) helmets, and using a cutting-tool-only approach for the Schutt Ion helmet whose FM cannot be removed with a screwdriver. Hardware (screws or QR mechanisms) was altered to unexpectedly challenge subjects during removal. Independent variables were helmet-FM attachment system (Traditional, QR, Ion) and hardware status (unaltered, altered) for a total of five conditions: 1) traditional unaltered (Trad), 2) traditional altered (TradAlt), 3) QR unaltered (QR), 4) QR altered (QRAlt), and 5) Ion. An investigator reviewed, and subjects practiced, pertinent FM removal techniques before data collection. Subjects encountered each condition twice in random order and were blinded to hardware condition. A stopwatch measured time and a three-dimensional motion capture system recorded helmet motion. If the FM remained attached at 3 minutes, the trial was considered a failure. Repeated measures ANOVAs (α=.05) with follow-up pairwise comparisons were performed to test for differences between conditions for time and motion. Main Outcome Measures: Dependent variables included: removal success, removal time and combined 3-D head motion. Results: Successful FM removal frequency was 100% (50/50) for Trad and QR, 96% (48/50) for Ion, 94% (47/50) for TradAlt, 72% (36/50) for QRAlt. Significant effects were detected for time (F=50.884,21, P =.001) and head motion (F=13.584,21, P=.001). Pairwise comparisons revealed significant differences in removal time between all conditions except between TradAlt (84.41±15.60s) and Ion (89.96 ±33.26s; P=.278). The fastest condition-mean removal time was 34.63±14.24 (QR); the slowest was 101.35±22.74 (QRAlt). Pairwise comparisons for motion revealed QR (10.15±3.02°) and Trad (12.07±3.90°) to be significantly different from QRAlt (16.13±5.00°), TradAlt (17.78±6.72°), and Ion (15.02±3.29°; P< .05). Conclusions: The unaltered QR resulted in the fastest FM removal times with less head motion than the other helmets. When loop strap cutting was required (altered QR, altered traditional, Ion), there were significantly longer removal times, more motion and lower success rates. These results suggest that the functional QR is ideal for FM removal, but our alteration-induced failure of the QR mechanism significantly challenged our subjects’ ability to remove the FM. Word Count: 445

Belmore KM*, Swartz EE†, Decoster LC, Armstrong CW: †University of New
Hampshire, Durham, NH, *Plymouth State University, Plymouth, NH