Detailed study on gear, or lack of and it's impact on rider injury in the event of a crash
http://www.svmc.se/smc_filer/SMC%20centralt/Rapporter/de%20Rome%20et%20al%20Gear%201_%202011.pdf

I skimmed the study, but it seemed to say that you were less likely to have abrasions on your hands if you wore gloves, less likely to have abrasions on your elbows and shoulders if you wore a moto jacket, less likely to have abrasions on your knees and legs if you wore moto pants, and less likely to have abrasions on your ankles if you wore boots.  It also said that, generally, if you wear gear, you are less likely to go to the hospital (which in a lot of cases, I assume if because of said abrasions).

yes, that's the condensed version smarty  .  I just like numbers and found it interesting to look at the levels of injury vs types and amount of gear. Doesn't say anything we really don't know. But does illuminate some details.

Again, this is just from skimming, but the boots and back protector parts were interesting, but I'm sure there's some explanation for those.  I assume there is a significant difference if you look at severity of injury/hospitalization for moto v. non-moto boots.  It's not hard to get to the hospital with a bad ankle abrasion (i.e. one where any boots would help).  Also, it's not hard to fracture your foot even when wearing moto-specific boots.  But I bet there are a bunch of those cases where there are much more severe injuries (i.e. a really make the beast with two backsed up ankle v. a fractured foot) from non-moto boots than moto boots.

Anyway, thanks.   

As bad as my injury was when I got hit by the semi, the boots prevented major injury to my foot/ankle...

A difficult read, but interesting.

It appears that moto boots aren't much better than non-moto boots as far as protection is concerned.
It would be helpful to know what the typical non-moto boots are in that area of Oz.

Apparently moto gear isn't all that helpful in preventing fractures, even with armor.
However, much of Table 3 and 4 had entries with "NS" annotations..... we need a statistician or the like to clarify.
I'd not be surprised if that's mostly true.