Full disclosure, the title is clickbait, I love a bit of road riding and in this case my helmet didn’t make any difference either way. But let’s not let that get in the way of a good story.

In early June I had a bad over the bars flip on the road bike onto my chin (no time to break my fall with my hands and given that I landed on my chin my helmet didn’t make a difference), leaving me with a bad concussion and no memory of the day. After a week of mild confusion and achey-ness everything felt back to normal.

Cut to Tuesday evening (just arrived on holiday in the Gower) and I get a slight, temporary numbness in my right arm and right side of my face. After umming and ahhing, decide to head into Swansea A&E for a check up. A long wait later and a check up that revealed nothing wrong physically, a CT scan was ordered to be on the safe side before I was discharged.

Low and behold, 3 months after my accident it turns out I’d got a large subarachnoid haemorrhage resulting in bleeding on my brain, with no outward symptoms other than the aforementioned 10 minutes of numbness. A rapid blue light journey to Cardiff and then brain surgery on Wednesday evening and I wake up feeling fine. So fine in fact that I’ll be being discharged this afternoon, feeling rather glad that I went and got it all checked out. Excellent care from every single member of NHS staff I saw and very rapid treatment as well as a very rapid recovery that seems to have surprised everyone, no doubt helped by being 22 and physically fit.

Here’s hoping that this treatment has knocked this all on the head (pun intended) and there is a lesson to be learnt about throwing myself off bicycles somewhere in there, as well as getting seemingly minor injuries/illnesses checked out!

As you can tell there’s been a lot of sitting around and boredom so far today!

I’m going full-face on my road bike now.

I’m going full-face on my road bike now.

I’m waxing my beard.

what home trepanning kit?

subarachnoid haemorrhage

a haemorrhage under your spider robot?

So would you have suddenly died if it remained undetected?

Subarachnoid haemorrhage – NHS Choices
http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/Subarachnoid-haemorrhage/Pages/Introduction.aspx
A subarachnoid haemorrhage is an uncommon type of stroke caused by bleeding on the surface of the brain. It’s a very serious condition and can be fatal.

Sheeeeeit – get well soon

Sod this biking lark, too dangerous.

I’m going back to bed.

Well done OP for getting this sorted.
Yes could have been very serious. My FiL died from this.

I’ve had a less severe brain injury from a head impact – resulted in mood changes for 6 months or so but didn’t require any intervention – be careful/seek medical help/make sure your family and friends are looking out for you if you have hit your head people.

OP, that sounds pretty scary!

Hospitals are generally pretty good at this, no one wants blood on their hands.
I had an RTC and felt fine, airbag went off and my head didn’t hit the A or B pillars of the car, didn’t hit the windscreen or steering wheel either…but 10 days later my coordination was all over the place, I was talking shite and appeared (according to family) very tired…better half took me to A&E who listened to what she had to say about the car accident and duly kept me in all night…endless baseline obvs, regular neuro obs and a couple of visits from consultants to perform their own extended neuro evaluations culminated in a scan the next morning and I was given the all clear…no internal head injury, referred back to GP who suspected mild epilepsy instead who then referred to Neurology consultant who instead discovered stress and exhaustion as the causes…but nonetheless excellent safety netting from the NHS re. the potential for head injury.

Well i came looking to read a pointless big hitters arguement. I’m disappointed.

However, jeez, that sounds lucky in an unlucky sort of way!

To potentially start an arguement I’ll ask if you were wearing high vis at the time 😉

Glad you are doing ok. Take it steady for a good while even if you feel ok. You are 22 lots of time ahead to ride and fall off bikes so dont rush back.

You can almost imagine the Daily Mail headline:

“Selfish Lycra Lout doesn’t wear high-vis, throws himself on road, wasting NHS time and your hard earned taxpaying money”.

It’s all a big relief that treatment has gone so smoothly and easily and that it was detected. As I understand it, it could have lead to a severe stroke/death if left untreated/undetected, which was a little worrying given the lack of symptoms. Thankfully woke up this morning after last night’s surgery feeling completely normal. Will be taking it easy!

And I have the joy of dealing with the DVLA to see where I stand with driving to look forward to.

I think it’s great that you didn’t need a ghost writer to type that for you. 🙂 Take care and don’t chin any more roads.

Woooaaaah!! Pleased you thought it worth getting checked out & all is now well!!!

Glad your story had a good ending, so easily might not have. Safe riding OP!

Did you go to the hospital after the initial crash? Just wondering if it’s something that could have been picked up at the time (if you didn’t go) or if nothing significant was seen at the time. Glad you’re ok!

**** that’s scary!

Glad you decided to get checked out.

I am so glad that this post had a happy ending. Thanks for sharing, OP. There is something to be learned from what you say.

glad to see recovery ongoing. I had SAH back in 1980 apparently quite common in young men according to surgeon( i was 19 at the time).Looking back must have been very lucky as mine burst one night! any how quick operation to get clip fitted home for tea and medals after 10 days. Recovery took a while felt really tired all the time put on lots of weight. Fast forward to now never been further problems.circulation is not as good as it was on LHS. I hope all continues to goes well for you. told not to drive for 3 months have you checked this ? so dont ignore a bang on the head SAH can happen weeks after impacts

Well done fella.

Work in a neuro rehab unit, we’ve had a few residents with bike accident related bleeds over the years.

I’ve just fed one chap some pureed food, which is a huge step forward for him as he’s been P.E.G fed for the last year or so.
He won’t be walking or doing much for himself for quite a while and will need care 24 hrs a day for the rest of his life.

Always best to get checked out again if you have any issues, no matter how insignificant they may seem.

Wow, glad you’re OK now

How did the accident happen?

Yes, I went to the hospital (LGI) straight after the initial accident in June. I had a CT scan that afternoon (although I remember very little of the day) which didn’t show an brain bleeding. Apparently I then suffered a chronic bleed, slowly building over a period of weeks as opposed to an initial fast bleed, which was why it didn’t show on the initial CT. It’s taken 3 months for the bleed to build to be large enough that it was pressing on my brain and starting to cause small seizures/episodes of numbness.

In terms of the initial accident, I have no memory of it. I suspect from finding it’s location on Strava that it was hitting a pot hole half way down a steep hill in Leeds, potentially without the best grip.on the bars.

Glad you are OK, and well done for getting checked immediately symptoms appeared. My friend’s wife was not so lucky after a very low speed (and now infamous – selfie posted) spill without her helmet. A year ago last weekend.

Well done the NHS. You’ve been bloody lucky there & hats off for getting yourself checked out. Can’t imagine the alternative scenario / outcome …

You can almost imagine the Daily Mail headline

To me the (admitted, I know) “click bait” title has real similarities.

I must ask, if the op is really making that point, is there any evidence that a helmet might make a difference to similar impacts (not to the chin obvs)?

Glad you got checked out and are now okay OP. Stay safe out there kids

Who knows whether the helmet would have made a difference had I hit my head on the actual helmet, it would just be speculation, though I’m certainly not going to stop wearing it.

The actual impact was taken wholey by my chin, my hands were still on the (flat) bars when I hit the ground, as shown by the grazes going across my brake levers and over the top of my hands/forearms. I suspect I was lucky not to break my jaw/a lot of teeth, 2 stitches in my chin and a chipped tooth was the extent of the damage, given I was probably travelling about 20mph. The site of the bleed (and the hole they drilled) ended up being about two inches above my left ear though, so had the hit been to the helmet it potentially could have dissipated the force enough to stop the brain bleed.

The condition ended up being a chronic subdural haematoma, which developed after the inital CT scan I had a few hours after the accident (which showed nothing out of the ordinary). Most worrying for me was that the symptoms took so long to develop (over three months!) and could easily have been ignored until more permanent/life changing damage had occurred. There is probably a lesson to be learnt about getting a check up after any serious head injury!
As it is I think I got very lucky, aided by bothering to get the symptoms checked at A&E and most likely my age/fitness making recovery more straight forward.

Edit to add: The bleed was not definitively attributed to the accident, but they were almost certain that it was, especially given the unlikeness of it being spontaneous/unrelated given my age.

Lolwut? you crashed without hitting your head and this means we should all wear helmets?

I went for a run this morning and stubbed my toe. Next time I’d better wear a steel codpiece?

I did hit my head, just not in an area protected by the helmet (chin), maybe we should all be wearing full faces when out on the road? 😆

Joking aside, the quip about wearing a helmet was purely clickbait, it’s impossible to know if I had hit an area of my head covered by the helmet whether or not it would have provided enough protection to have prevented the bleed, that would be purely speculation. And granted if I hadn’t been wearing my helmet it wouldn’t have changed the outcome of this particular crash, but it’s not going to stop me wearing it in the future.

On a serious note, the main lesson learnt was in getting seemingly minor symptoms checked out quickly, even a long while after the initial injury.

Jeebus! That’s a scary story.
Good call going to A&E OP.

Hope you are fully recovered soon.

kind of surprised that they couldnt find evidence of a reduction in length of stay

linky