BECAUSE of her hospital placements and studies, we haven’t seen much of veterinary surgeon turned doctor Kate Keenan this season but she has been attending events over the past few weekends.

Kate had two reasons for being at Vesey Lodge on Saturday. One was to see her mare Ardkyle Je Taime win the EI100 under Steven Smith on just her second start and the other was to continue her George Mernagh Bursary-funded survey into the wearing of air jackets by event riders.

“There is a small body of academic literature to support the claim that air jackets can reduce serious injuries following falls XC, although it is acknowledged they may not prevent catastrophic injury in rotational falls,” states Keenan. “There is, however, no research to date asking riders their opinions or experiences – all studies to date have been academic or technology based. So, in this project, I want to survey the views of event riders at all levels as to their opinions on the use of air jackets in eventing.

“Really, I’m hoping a safety related study will be of interest to all event riders and aid in generating increased awareness of potential ways to improve safety which ultimately may be of some benefit to contributing to safety developments in the sport.”

The link to Survey Monkey for data collection for the study is now live. Please see: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/Airjacket