It's our national sport, but some claim it's a national disgrace. They say too many hockey players are taking too many blows to the head.

When it happens to the pros, it makes the news. But it also happens to amateurs. Old-timers trying to keep fit are at risk, and so are youngsters just learning the game. Their injuries may not make headlines and there may be no reliable statistics, but most people who know the game now agree: multiple concussions, leading to permanent disability, are a growing problem in the last decade.

"You can withstand the first blow or the second blow, but let's just say a third blow can render you with a permanent deficit," says neurologist Dr. Charles Tator. "This is really new knowledge that comes to a sport like hockey."

A third blow can render you with a permanent deficit," says neurologist Dr. Charles Tator

For Dan Nicoletti that new knowledge came too late, with his fourth head injury in one season. "I remember shaking on the way to the dressing room," he recalls. "I just did not feel good. All those feelings of the first three concussions were coming back to me, but two and three times more. I'm starting to shake a little now just remembering it."

Dan's father Jim remembers all too well: "When I saw my son in the condition he was in with tears in his eyes and shaking - there was no need to go on. It was over at that point."

What was over was the promise of a pro career. Dan Nicoletti was one of those young players with "star" written all over him. From an early age it looked like big No. 4 could go all the way to the NHL. But today he's forced to watch from the stands while his younger brother wears his number. The doctors told Dan he had to quit.

Jim and Dan Nicoletti

Dr. Charles Tator has had to do that before - tell someone their dreams of a pro career are over. "It's a very tough thing to do to a youngster who's built his whole dreams, and his whole livelihood and career planning on the basis of becoming a professional hockey player and you have to say, 'Look, your brain has had it,'" Tator says.

It's happening more often as the problem of concussions grows. But why?

Tator has studied the victims of multiple concussions in hockey. He says the game has dramatically changed in the last 10 years, but the standard for helmets hasn't kept up.

Pat Bishop chairs the CSA committee for hockey equipment

"All the players I have seen who have suffered from repeated minor concussion have been wearing helmets approved by CSA or one of the other bodies that provides that standard," Tator says. "That would indicate to me that our standards are too low."

The only standard that matters in Canada is written by the Canadian Standards Association.

The heart of the CSA standard for helmets is a drop test to find out how they stand up to an impact. To measure that, the standard calls for a drop of less than a metre. Pat Bishop chairs the CSA committee for hockey equipment, and says that's as tough as the test needs to be.

"I haven't seen any evidence that the equipment certified by CSA for use in ice hockey is inferior," Bishop says.

We took the helmets to a leading expert on helmet safety

So who's right? Marketplace wanted to see for ourselves. We got an old-timers team to give up some of their helmets. We collected helmets from young players too. And we also purchased some second-hand helmets and some brand new helmets right off the shelf.

Marketplace took the helmets to a leading expert on helmet safety at the Southern Impact Research Centre in Knoxville Tennessee.

We wanted two tests. First, we wanted to know how the Canadian hockey helmet standard measures up to standards for other sports helmets. And second, we wanted to know how helmet safety is affected by the repeated use of the helmet and by the passage of time.

How do hockey helmets measure up to the standard for other helmets like bike helmets or skateboard helmets?

Dave Halstead believes our CSA hockey helmet standard is not good enough

Dave Halstead, head of the research centre, says: "significantly lower."

He believes our CSA hockey helmet standard is not good enough. "The standard does not require enough of the helmet," says Halstead, who grew up in up-state New York playing hockey as a youngster. He knows about helmets. Halstead's tested helmets for all kinds of sports for 20 years. He's on the committee that sets the standard for hockey helmets in the U.S., and on the international committee for hockey helmet standards.

And he's seen helmet technology improve. He's seen helmet materials improve, and standards for other helmets get tougher -- but not the standard for hockey helmets.

Halstead compares hockey to field lacrosse. He argues the two games are very similar, and that hockey helmets should be just as good as lacrosse helmets. But the drop test for field lacrosse helmets is twice as high and generates three times the impact energy as the drop test for hockey helmets. Halstead claims hockey helmets can't measure up.

Halstead argues that lacrosse and hockey are similar - and that hockey helmets should be just as good as lacrosse helmets

He noted that "11 of the 16 models [Marketplace] submitted failed to meet the lacrosse standard."

• SEE OUR TEST RESULTS

NEXT: Hockey helmet test results »

^TOP