What type of study is this?

This is a Human Clinical Trial study (also classified as: Observational).

August 19, 2025

Sustained-till-exhaustion effects of firefighter helmets on neck muscle fatigue mechanism

Puntos clave

The US firefighter helmet caused greater muscle activation, faster fatigue, and reduced endurance during neck tasks.
Fatigue was assessed using normalized mean absolute value and median frequency of EMG signals across four intervals.
Analysis included 36 firefighters performing tasks with no helmet and two helmet styles, US and European.
Findings emphasize the need to optimize center of mass for helmet safety and comfort for firefighters.

Resumen

This study investigates how helmet inertial properties-mass and centre of mass (COM)-influence neck muscle fatigue to support the biomechanical design of firefighter helmets. Thirty-six firefighters (18 males, 18 females) performed sustained neck flexion and extension tasks under three conditions: no-helmet, US, and European-style (EU) helmets. Neck angles, endurance time, discomfort ratings, and electromyography (EMG) data from eight neck muscles were collected. Fatigue was assessed as an increase in normalised mean absolute value (NMAV) and decrease in median frequency (MF) of EMG signals, segmented into four intervals (0-25%, 26-50%, 51-75%, 76-100%).Piece-wise regression and ANOVA analyses of NMAV and MF slopes for each interval showed that the US helmet led to greater muscle activation, faster fatigue, and reduced endurance. These findings highlight the importance of optimising COM location-not just the weight-when designing a helmet to reduce neck injury risks.

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Cite This Study

Wei et al. (Tue,) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/68af4766ad7bf08b1ead4aa8 https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1080/00140139.2025.2548004

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