The background to the development of D3O and its introduction as an impact-absorbing material was that Richard Palmer, its inventor and a keen sports fan, realised that it could be used in ski suits for the American and Canadian ski teams in the Turin Winter Olympics in 2006. A particular problem exists for the Giant Slalom and Super G racers who try to go as close to the control gates as possible so as to shave tenths of a second from their time. Although the gates are spring loaded, hitting them at 60-70 mph creates severe bruising on the arms and legs, but since the amount of wind resistance is also crucial, thick padding is out of the question. D3O, with its special properties of absorbing impact whilst being quite thin proved to be ideal and the so-called Spider suits of the North American teams incorporate D3O. Perhaps not entirely coincidentally those teams have also been highly successful, particularly at the last Winter Olympics in 2010 in Vancouver.

Many other winter sports applications followed, including hip protectors for snowboarders and even figure skaters, before the product was launched into the motorcycle apparel market with hip, shoulder, knee and elbow protectors incorporated into the specialised motorcycle suits. It became obvious that D3O would be a suitable partner as they had succeeded with products that protected similar body parts, i.e. hips, in extreme conditions. Their move into supplying the military and police in several countries meant that they were able to work with organisations with demanding standards and long lead times. It was therefore a natural decision to use D3O in a parallel market - medical devices - that took advantage of the material's special properties to absorb impact in life-and-death applications.

The main benefit is that it will save you from breaking your hip because Fall-Safe has been tested in the most accurate simulation of an actual fall, using a special test rig, when the forces generated on the point of the hip can be around 3,500 Newtons, and it reduced them to just over 1,000 Newtons. The same tests showed that the best any other hip protector could do was to reduce them to something over 1,700 Newtons, which can still break a hip if the person is osteoporotic and it will certainly cause such severe bruising that the faller will be incapacitated for many days.

Because of the nature of the Fall-Safe hip protector it is very light, soft, flexible, cool thanks to its numerous vents and internal grooves, and thus very comfortable to wear. Up to now, hip protectors have been rather rigid, bulky and clammy to wear, especially in hot weather, or in bed at night. Fall-Safe hip protectors are normally worn around the clock without discomfort, thereby providing complete protection. This can be very important because many falls occur at night thanks to slippery floors, dimmer lighting, unseen obstacles and general drowsiness.

Because Fall-Safe hip protectors are easily removed and inserted in another pair of pants, only one pair of hip protectors is needed per 4 sets of pants which dramatically reduces the initial cost compared with most hip protectors that are sewn-into the pants so cannot be removed, making them harder and more expensive to wash, and requiring one pair of hip protectors for each of the four pairs of pants. Fall-Safe hip protectors can be washed hundreds of times and should last for three years. As they don't have to be thrown away when the pants are worn out, the cost of ownership is much less.

Fall-Safe is a hip protector manufactured from a new material called D3O which is highly effective in absorbing impacts because it has a special property that causes the normally free-flowing molecules to "lock"  instantly on receiving an impact. This dissipates the load over the area of the pad and transmits only about 30% of the impact to the body wearing it. After the impact the D3O material then immediately relaxes into its previous flexible mode. This material, which is basically a liquid elastomer, was discovered some time ago but no-one until Richard Palmer, the inventor and founder of D3O, could figure out how to make it stable so that it retained its form, rather than oozing away as a liquid. In fact the material can take a very contoured shape to fit neatly over the hip and reduce the profile so that the wearer is not burdened with a flat, bulky, slab of material, typical of most other hip protectors.

Fall-Safe was developed because it was apparent that the numbers of elderly people falling and breaking their hip was steadily increasing in the UK and worldwide. In fact the rate of annual increase is greater than the rate of population growth in the relevant age range, so the problem is getting steadily worse and will soon reach, in the words of Professor Cameron Swift, Emeritus Professor for Health Care of the Elderly , "epidemic proportions". This increase has occurred despite numerous public health initiatives, such as earlier diagnosis of balance and gait problems and the compiling of statistics and databases to focus on the problem. The main reason that hip protectors have not, so far, been widely adopted is that after much initial enthusiasm for them in the early 2000s, the numerous drawbacks that the earlier generation of devices suffered from became apparent. These problems included limited effectiveness in reducing the impact of a fall, great discomfort in wearing them, especially the hard shell type made from rigid plastic, although this is also true to a lesser extent in all hip protectors except Fall-Safe, and the consequent reluctance of osteoporosis sufferers to wear them.