Research Detecting Spine Injury in Children in Car Accidents
New research published this month in the journal Injury finds that while fatal cervical spine injuries to children in motor vehicle crashes are rare, they are more commonly seen in girls, in children who were restrained in passenger restraints, and in children who also suffered traumatic brain injury due to the crash (see also Pediatrics).
Researchers from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, The University of Pennsylvania and Ohio State University Medical Center studied 6,065 children younger than 16 years old and found that only 2.9% of the fatalities involved a cervical spine injury.
This study represents the first time a research team has used a linked version of two previously independent data sets from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) to enable in-depth analysis of the relationship between crash characteristics such as speed or vehicle type, and type of injury (including CSI) for fatally injured children. The two large national mortality databases used were the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) and Multiple Cause-of-Death (MCOD) datasets.
Read the entire article: "Research Consortium Advances Understanding of Cervical Spine Injuries in Children Involved in Motor Vehicle Crashes.(Report)." Health & Medicine Week. NewsRX. 2009. HighBeam Research. 11 Sep. 2009 <http://www.highbeam.com>.
