SnowBoarding

[steve119]

Hi This may seem like a silly question, but i was wondering about taking up snowboarding, has anyone on Warfarin taken this up, and if so will being on the warfarin prevent me from doing this activity? In particular i'm worried about the number of falls i may have, i especially don't want to be landing on my head. Anyone out there continued doing these sorts of activites? Thanks

 

[geebee]

I think you should be fine as long as you wear a helmet.

 

[tobagotwo]

I agree on the helmet. Bumps and bruises are fine, but cranial protection is important.

If you hit a tree hard enough so that the helmet doesn't help, the Coumadin isn't going to matter anyway.

Best wishes,

 

[Guest]

Tobago has it right.

 

[DrAllan]

Helmets are designed to absorb the energy of impact before it gets transmitted to the skull and ultimately to the brain. However, there are several mechanisms of brain damage that can occur even with a helmet. One is a contra-coup injury where the skull stops moving but the brain continues to accelerate until stopped by the inside of the skull. This can damage the brain itself or cause tearing of the blood vessels between the dura (the thick non-elastic covering of the brain) and the brain itself. This will cause bleeding into the space between the brain and the dura resulting in a ?sub-dural? hemorrhage.

A good web site with information about brain injury is http://www.tbiguide.com/howbrainhurt.html

For historical sake, President Reagan had a sub-dural when he fell off of his horse on the ranch.

 

[Lynlw]

Steve, I think it might also depend on what kind of snowboarding you want to do,just going down the hill, or hanging out in the terrain park. Justin does the terrain parks, w/ rails, boxes jumps 1/2 pipe. They crash alot and Justin and his friend are always getting black and blue and a few broken bones from falling off the rails and hitting differnt body parts on the metal when they fall, Justin evendented his helmet on a rail,, and i've seen some pretty bad crashes on the 1/2 pipe, last year Justin was snowboarding w/ a friend who hit his head in the terrain park and was taken way in the amblance with pretty bad concussion, and he had a helmet on.so I don't know if that kind of snowboarding would be good to do on Coumidin,
IF you are talking about going down hill, like most of the skiers do, where when you fall you just usually hit snow, I think that would be fine.

 

[Lynlw]

Helmets are designed to absorb the energy of impact before it gets transmitted to the skull and ultimately to the brain. However, there are several mechanisms of brain damage that can occur even with a helmet. One is a contra-coup injury where the skull stops moving but the brain continues to accelerate until stopped by the inside of the skull. This can damage the brain itself or cause tearing of the blood vessels between the dura (the thick non-elastic covering of the brain) and the brain itself. This will cause bleeding into the space between the brain and the dura resulting in a ?sub-dural? hemorrhage.

A good web site with information about brain injury is http://www.tbiguide.com/howbrainhurt.html

For historical sake, President Reagan had a sub-dural when he fell off of his horse on the ranch.

Dr.Allen, not to hijack the thread, but isn't that how shaken babies can end up w/ brain damage?

 

[Magic8Ball]

Speaking with my surgeon last week about things like this as i consider him quite a progressive guy.

I was asking about activities and he said i could continue to ride a motorbike (not off road) do stuff like touch rugby etc....one of the few things he advised against was ski-ing (so snow boarding would be close match) due to the frequent falls and head banging.

His basic stance was that everything can be done as long as you have done a risk/benefit assessment and understand whats involved. If you really want to do it then do it.

From my experience ski-ing i'd say i wouldn't do it again at this stage of my life as although the head trauma is scary you also have leg breaks, knee ligament damage etc which would not be good to go into emergency surgery for that when on coudamin.

Regards.

 

[MrP]

Last week my 18 yr old son suffered a concussion when snowboarding near Tahoe, and he suffered short term memory loss for a couple of days and severe headache for several days. He kept asking the same questions over and over....how did I get here (the hospital)?, who brought me here?, what day is it? where am I? I'd answer all his questions, and after few minutes would pass, he'd ask all the same questions again. Thank goodness the CT scan showed no internal bleeding. My son is a very experienced snowboarder and injured himself going over a small three foot mound of snow. The ER doctor went into great detail about his injury and commented that he was lucky there was no internal bleeding. The doctor said that sometimes delayed bleeding will occur up to several weeks after injury to the brain, although rare. The doctor also made the comment, "good thing he's not taking coumadin". My son is doing much better now but still can't remember the incident and events that day.

I share this in the hope it will help some make a wise decision regarding snowboarding.

 

[DrAllan]

Lynlw:
Yes, the mechanism is the same.

Mr. P:
Read the info at the site I posted and you will understand how your son?s ?wiring: has been disrupted. The damage could be as simple as swelling of nerve fibers, which will probably be reversible to a more permanent kind.

 

[Philip]

I'm with Geebee; wear a helmet and have fun.
I will ski next month for the 1st time since AVR and Coumadin. My oldest son wants to learn to snowboard so I will give it a try as well.

It seems like we have quite a few skiers. Is anyone skiing the Snowmas/Aspen area President's Day/Mardi Gras?
Philip

 

[LUVMyBirman]

When you board....you are more apt to hit your head. When you fall....it's either front/back or roll. Almost always the head/neck is involved. I have decided to just stick to good old fashioned skiing. On Warfarin

 

[geebee]

I have done a lot of things that are supposedly "forbidden" for coumadin users including off-road motorcycling, racing sailboats, etc.

I figure I went through 3 OHS to live my life the way I want. Although I realize there are risks, I am willing to take them. After all, there is probably more risk driving my car on the freeway.

 

[mtkayak]

Yep, wear a helmet and go have fun. No use in worrying your life away. I whitewater kayak and encouter all kinds of rocks. Just buy the best helmet on the market. That's the best thing you can do to protect yourself.

I had a 50lbs. fence panel land on my head while building a fence. Man, I was dizzy after that. No worries though, I'm fine.

Brain bleeds are bad news, Coumadin or no Coumadin.

 

[MrP]

Thanks DrAllan for the excellent article and information regarding brain injuries. I emailed to my son the website url. He's back to normal but just can't remember events the day of the accident. And I agree we should live our lives without unnecessary worry and shouldn't give up those activities that we enjoy. And I also agree more accidents are likely to occur from snowboarding than skiing, especially head injury with or without a helmet. Life is full of choices!

 

[MarkU]

Buy the best helmet you can afford and go for it.
As long as you understand and accept the risks, it's your decision to make.
I've not let Coumadin affect my lifestyle in the past six years, in fact, I'm doing more "high risk" stuff now than prior to my AVR - like the cycling I do in my triathlon training.
Good luck,
Mark