bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Cycling safety: injury prevention in Oxford cyclists: Table 1
Authors: McGuire L , Smith N 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To assess injury prevention measures used by cyclists in Oxford and to detect any differences between wearers and non-wearers of cycling helmets.Method—A prospective observational survey of a series of cyclists passing a single point on a busy city road in reduced lighting. Two observers jointly recorded four measures of injury prevention: use of front or rear light, high visibility (reflective or fluorescent) clothing, and cycling helmet. The use of the first three interventions was analysed in relation to helmet use/non-use.Results—A total of 392 cyclists were observed over one hour. Fourteen (3.6%) were observed to use all four studied measures, while 137 (34.9%) used none of them. The frequency of measures observed was: lit front light 190 (48.5%), lit rear light 197 (50.2%), both lights on 163 (41.6%), helmet on 104 (26.5%), and high visibility clothing 39 (9.9%).Despite the helmet using group's smaller size, it contained a significantly higher proportion of cyclists with lit front light (60.6%v44.1%), lit rear light (61.5%v46.2%), and high visibility clothing (27.9%v3.5%), than the non-helmet group (p≤0.01). Whereas only 22% of the helmet users had no other observed measures, 47.2% of non-users did so.Conclusion—Cycling helmet users were significantly more likely to use collision prevention measures in conditions of reduced visibility. Explanations may include higher levels of risk awareness and greater knowledge of safe cycling practices in the smaller, helmet using group. However, current measures by cyclists in a major cycling centre may be insufficient to prevent collisions and consequent serious injury or death.
Capture-recapture: a useful methodological tool for counting traffic related injuries?
Authors: Morrison A , Stone D H 
Published: October 2002

Introduction—Although the capture-recapture technique is increasingly employed in studies of human populations to correct for under-ascertainment in traditional epidemiological surveillance, it has rarely been used in injury research.Objectives—To estimate the completeness of official data sources on traffic related injuries (TRIs) by using the capture-recapture technique and to calculate an ascertainment corrected number of fatal and serious TRIs among Scottish young people aged 15–24 years. The appropriateness of the approach in this context is also assessed.Method—A two sample capture-recapture technique was applied to two official sources of TRI data. Data on TRIs were obtained from the Scottish Health Service and the STATS19 dataset at the University of Essex Data Archive for 1995. Four standards (A-D) of matching were applied to fatalities and serious TRIs to allow plausible relaxation of matching standards within the context of the data collection setting. The completeness of each data source was assessed, and an ascertainment corrected number of fatalities and serious TRIs calculated.Results—The ascertainment corrected number of TRI fatalities among 15–24 year olds using standard D was 104. This represents only a small increase in the number of fatalities using capture-recapture than when using each individual dataset. The completeness of the Scottish Health Service database for TRI fatalities was 93%. The STATS19 database was 95% complete. The ascertainment corrected number of TRI hospital admissions was 1969. The STATS19 and the Scottish Health Service databases were approximately two thirds and three quarters complete respectively for non-fatal TRIs requiring hospitalisation.Conclusions—Injury researchers have advocated the linkage of major datasets to supplement and improve the quality of injury data. Using capture-recapture we found that routine databases enumerate TRI fatalities accurately, in contrast to injury morbidity databases that do not. Capture-recapture is a potentially useful method of evaluating the completeness of data sources and identifying biases within datasets. However, ascertainment corrected rates should be viewed with caution. A number of requirements of the capture-recapture technique are unachieved in this study of injury in the human population.
A preschool program for safety and injury prevention delivered by home visitors
Authors: Johnston B D , Britt J , D'Ambrosio L , Mueller B A , Rivara F P 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To evaluate the feasibility, acceptability, and effectiveness of an injury prevention program delivered by school based home visitors to the families of low income children attending preschool enrichment programs in Washington State.Study sample—The families of children attending preschool Head Start programs in two regions were eligible. A total of 213 families (77.8% of those eligible) from intervention sites, and 149 families (71.9% of those eligible) from concurrent comparison sites, agreed to participate and completed the trial.Intervention—Trained school personnel conducted home safety inspections as part of a planned home visit. Intervention families were offered educational materials as well as smoke detectors, batteries, ipecac, and age appropriate car safety restraints based on results of the home inspection.Evaluation methods—At a repeat home visit three months later, the proportion of families with a positive change in injury prevention knowledge or behavior among those in the intervention group was compared with the proportion in the comparison group. Smoke detector presence and function were observed.Results—Among families without a working smoke detector at baseline, the intervention was associated with an increased probability of having a working detector at follow up (relative risk (RR) 3.3, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.3 to 8.6). Intervention families were also more likely to report the presence of ipecac in the home (RR 4.7, 95% CI 3.0 to 7.3) at follow up and to have obtained an age appropriate booster seat (RR 4.1, 95% CI 1.9 to 8.8). The program was acceptable to client families and to the home visitors who conducted the intervention.Conclusions—Among the families of low income children enrolled in preschool enrichment programs, home safety inspections and the distribution of safety supplies by school based home visitors appears to improve knowledge and behavior related to poisoning, smoke detector installation, and car safety seat use over three months of follow up.
Work related spinal cord injury, Australia 1986–97
Authors: O'Connor P 
Published: October 2002

Objectives—Little has been published before on the epidemiology and prevention of work related spinal cord injury (SCI). This study is the first national population based epidemiological analysis of this type of injury. It presents that largest case series ever reported.Setting—The study utilises information from the Australian Spinal Cord Injury Register, which has full coverage of the population.Methods—All newly incident cases of SCI from 1986 to 1997 were considered.Results—Work related SCI accounted for about 13% of all traumatic cases of SCI over the period 1986–97. The labour force based incidence rate in Australia averaged four cases per million of population per annum over the period. The rate was highest among those aged 25–34 years (4.9/million) and among farmers (17.0/million). Nearly half of the cases studied received their injury due to a fall. Motor vehicle crashes were also common and vehicle rollover was the predominant crash type. A high proportion of cases did not receive any compensation for their SCI.Conclusions—Although rare, SCI is one of the most severe and debilitating injuries that can be suffered in the workplace. As there is no cure for SCI, and the level of impairment does not improve substantially for the vast majority of cases even after rehabilitation, it is arguable that primary prevention should receive substantially greater emphasis.
How much outpatient care is provided for injuries?
Authors: Bishai D , Gielen A 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To estimate the average number of outpatient visits, emergency department visits, and hospitalizations for injured patients.Methods—The Medical Expenditure Panel Survey Household Component of 1996 is a weighted sample designed to represent the United States population. For each episode of injury the average number of office visits or outpatient contacts, emergency department visits, and hospitalizations were computed. Subsequently the ratio of outpatient to inpatient contacts for each type of injury was estimated.Results—When asked to report on their medical problems for the previous six months, the majority of respondents who recalled injuries did not report contact with emergency departments or hospitalization. The average injury is associated with only 0.2 to 0.3 emergency department visits. Sports related injuries were associated with 0.03 hospitalizations. Gun related injuries were associated with 0.12 hospitalizations. All types of injury were related with more than one episode of outpatient or office based care. The ratio of emergency department visits and outpatient visits to hospitalizations varies according to the nature of the injury.Conclusion—Policymakers interested in the cost of injury should account for the extensive outpatient utilization of injured patients.
Do safety practices differ between responders and non-responders to a safety questionnaire?
Authors: Kendrick D , Hapgood R , Marsh P 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To compare reported safety practices between responders and non-responders to a safety survey.Design—Cross sectional survey at baseline compared with safety practices reported at subsequent child health surveillance checks.Subjects—Parents of children aged 3–12 months registered with practices participating in a controlled trial of injury prevention in primary care that did, and did not, respond to the baseline survey and who subsequently attended child health surveillance checks.Results—No difference in safety practices was found between responders and non-responders to the survey at the 6–9 month check. Responders were more likely to report owning a stair gate (odds ratio (OR) 2.75, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.82 to 4.16) and socket covers (OR 2.16, 95% CI 1.53 to 3.04) at the 12–15 month check, and owning socket covers (OR 2.19, 95% CI 1.34 to 3.61) at the 18–24 month check. Responders were more likely to report greater than the median number of safety practices at the 18 month check.Conclusions—Non-responders to a safety survey appear to be less likely to report owning several items of safety equipment than responders. Further work is needed to confirm these findings. Extrapolating the results of safety surveys to the population as a whole may lead to over estimation of safety equipment possession.
Banning the “A word”: where's the evidence?
Authors: Evans S A 
Published: October 2002

Background—It is argued that use of the term “accident” has a negative effect on prevention efforts as the term implies that such events are due to chance.Aim—To test the hypothesis that use of “injury” in place of “accident” can influence professional attitudes towards “accident/injury” prevention.Setting—Leeds Health Authority area serving the population (n=740 000) of the city of Leeds in the Yorkshire region of England.Method—A randomised comparative study. Altogether 183 health visiting staff in the Leeds area were randomised (by place of work) to one of two groups. Each group received a similar postal questionnaire assessing attitudes relating to accident/injury prevention. One group received a questionnaire using only accident terminology while the other used injury terminology throughout.Results—Fifty responses in the accident group were received and 39 in the injury group. Analysis by Mann-Whitney U tests showed little difference in group responses. The only significant finding was that respondents in the “accident” group were more likely to rank “accident prevention” of higher importance relative to respondents in the “injury” group (median 2, 25%–75% quartiles 1.8–4.0 compared with median 4, 25%–75% quartiles 2.0–5.0, p=0.04). However, this may have been a chance finding due to the multiple comparisons made.Conclusions—This study has shown little difference in health visitor responses when “accident” is replaced with “injury”. It is possible that the effect of changing terminology is more nebulous—influencing society at large. However, it would be as well to recognise the lack of evidence and clarity relating to the terminology debate. Otherwise, there is a danger that the “injury” believers may become alienated from the “accident” diehards.
The new Brazilian traffic code and some characteristics of victims in southern Brazil
Authors: Liberatti C L B , Andrade S M , Soares D A 
Published: October 2002

Objective—The aim was to study characteristics of traffic accident victims before and after the implementation of the new Brazilian traffic code, in January 1998.Subjects and methods—The study population was car and motorcycle occupants seen in a pre-hospital care service in Londrina, Paraná State (Brazil) before the introduction of the new Brazilian traffic code, from 22 January to 21 July 1997, and after its implementation during the same period in 1998. Victims were analyzed over the time periods according to helmet and seat belt use, gender, underage driving, and alcohol on the breath.Results—Use of seat belts increased from 45% to 62.6% and of helmets from 31.2% to 66.2% after the introduction of the new Brazilian code. The proportion driving under age 18 and with perceptible alcoholic breath declined significantly only among motorcycle riders. There was a 20% decline in car occupant injuries along with a 9% reduction in motorcycle related injuries after the change of the law.Conclusion—Results favor the hypothesis that rigorous legislation increases safer practices in traffic, at least during the first months of its implementation.
Self strangulation by hanging from cloth towel dispensers in Canadian schools
Authors: Le D , Macnab A J 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To investigate a local “epidemic” of incidents of strangulation by hanging from continuous cloth towels in dispensers.Method—The coroner's office in all provinces and territories were contacted. Five cases of hanging from continuous cloth towels in Canadian schools were identified and reviewed.Results—There were four deaths, and one near-death, all males age 7 to 12. Two cases were attributed to a “choking game” that provides a sensation (impending loss of consciousness) described as “cool”. In three cases, the child was alone at the time. All deaths were due to strangulation from hanging and all occurred in school washrooms. One child (playing with two friends) recovered after admission to an intensive care unit.Towel dispensers were removed from the two index schools. In one province the Ministry of Education encouraged removal of towel dispensers from all schools and education of students of the dangers of “choking games”.Conclusions—Thrill seeking from partial asphyxiation appears to underlie these incidents. Awareness of such cases should prompt appropriate education strategies to highlight the serious consequences of this form of risk taking behavior in young males. In Canada, these incidents have resulted in changes in the design of, and legislation regarding, cloth towel dispensers.
Investigation of bias after data linkage of hospital admissions data to police road traffic crash reports
Authors: Cryer P C , Westrup S , Cook A C , Ashwell V , Bridger P , Clarke C 
Published: October 2002

Research question—Does a database of hospital admission data linked to police road traffic accident (RTA) reports produce less biased information for the injury prevention policymaker, planner, and practitioner than police RTA reports alone?Design—Data linkage study.Study population—Non-fatal injury victims of road traffic crashes in southern England who were admitted to hospital.Data sources—Hospital admissions and police RTA reports.Main outcome measures—The estimated proportion of road traffic crashes admitted to hospital that were included on the linked database; distributions by age, sex, and road user groups: (A) for all RTA injury admissions and (B) for RTA serious injury admissions defined by length of stay or by nature of injury.Results—An estimated 50% of RTA injury admissions were included on the linked database. When assessing bias, admissions data were regarded as the “gold standard”. The distributions of casualties by age, sex, and type of road user showed major differences between the admissions data and the police RTA injury data of comparable severity. The linked data showed smaller differences when compared with admissions data. For RTA serious injury admissions, the distributions by age and sex were approximately the same for the linked data compared with admissions data, and there were small but statistically significant differences between the distributions across road user group for the linked data compared with hospital admissions.Conclusion—These results suggest that investigators could be misinformed if they base their analysis solely on police RTA data, and that information derived from the linked database is less biased than that from police RTA data alone. A national linked dataset of road traffic crash data should be produced from hospital admissions and police RTA data for use by policymakers, planners and practitioners.
National attitudes concerning gun carrying in the United States
Authors: Hemenway D , Azrael D , Miller M 
Published: October 2002

Objectives—To determine public attitudes in the United States concerning gun carrying.Setting—In the past 15 years, many state legislatures have passed laws making it easier for United States citizens to carry concealed firearms, not only on the street but into various locations, including churches and government buildings.Methods—National random digit dial telephone surveys conducted in 1996 and 1999 asked questions concerning the public's feelings of safety as more people in their community carry firearms, and whether, in the language of the question, respondents believe “regular” citizens should be allowed to carry guns into public or government buildings.Results—Americans feel less safe rather than more safe as more people in their community begin to carry guns. By margins of at least nine to one, Americans do not believe that “regular” citizens should be allowed to bring their guns into restaurants, college campuses, sports stadiums, bars, hospitals, or government buildings.Conclusions—The public believes that increased gun carrying by others reduces rather than increases their safety. Overwhelmingly, the public believes that in many venues gun carrying should be prohibited.
Impact of graduated driver licensing restrictions on crashes involving young drivers in New Zealand
Authors: Begg D J , Stephenson S , Alsop J , Langley J 
Published: October 2002

Objective—To determine the impact on young driver crashes of the three main driving restrictions in the New Zealand graduated driver licensing (GDL) system: night-time curfew, no carrying of young passengers, and a blood alcohol limit of 30 mg/100 ml.Method—The database for this study was created by linking police crash reports to hospital inpatient records (1980–95). Multivariate logistic regression was used to compare car crashes involving a young driver licensed before GDL (n=2252) with those who held a restricted graduated licence (n=980) and with those who held a full graduated licence (n=1273), for each of the main driving restrictions.Results—Compared with the pre-GDL group, the restricted licence drivers had fewer crashes at night (p=0.003), fewer involving passengers of all ages (p=0.018), and fewer where alcohol was suspected (p=0.034), but not fewer involving young casualties (p=0.980). Compared with the pre-GDL drivers, those with the full graduated licence had fewer night crashes (p=0.042) but did not differ significantly for any of the other factors examined.Conclusion—These results suggest that some of the GDL restrictions, especially the night-time curfew, have contributed to a reduction in serious crashes involving young drivers.
Exposure to violence and its relationship to psychopathology in adolescents
Authors: Ward C L , Flisher A J , Zissis C , Muller M , Lombard C 
Published: October 2002

Objectives—This study aimed to establish prevalence of adolescents' exposure to violence and related symptoms in the South African context and to explore relationships between exposure and symptoms.Setting—Four high schools in Cape Town, South Africa.Methods—Self report questionnaires were administered to 104 students. Types of violence explored included: witnessing or being a victim of violence perpetrated by someone known to the child or in the home and witnessing or being a victim of violence perpetrated by a stranger. The Harvard Trauma Scale, Beck Depression Inventory, and Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale were used to assess potentially related symptoms.Results—The majority of children had been exposed to at least one type of violence, and exposure to the one type of violence was related to the other type. Symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and depression appear to be related to most types of exposure to violence, but anxiety symptoms only to exposure to violence perpetrated by someone known to the child or in the home.Conclusions—Rates of exposure to violence, and related symptoms, were unacceptably high. Symptoms were associated with exposure to violence.
Predictors of injury from fighting among adolescent males
Authors: Hammig B J , Dahlberg L L , Swahn M H 
Published: October 2002

Objectives—To identify violence related behaviors associated with injuries among adolescent males involved in fights.Methods—Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health were used to develop weighted estimates of injury prevalence and associations between injury and violence related behaviors.Results—Forty seven per cent injured others and 18% were themselves injured in a fight among adolescent males in the preceding 12 months. Group fighting, fighting with strangers, and weapon use were predictive of injury in this sample.Conclusions—These findings suggest that injuries associated with fighting are a health risk among adolescent males. Certain behaviors, such as fighting in groups and fighting with strangers, increase the likelihood of injuries requiring medical attention.