Death and serious injury in child motorcyclists

Exhaust system burn injuries in children

BACKGROUND/PURPOSE

The authors had noted a number of children who had sustained burn injuries from the exhaust systems of recreational vehicles and wished to document the incidence of pediatric burn injury sustained from the exhaust systems of a wide scope of motorized vehicles.

METHODS

The authors conducted a 10-year retrospective chart review including all children admitted to our institution with burn injuries from contact with vehicular exhaust systems.

RESULTS

Twenty-three children were included. There were 18 boys, with a median patient age of 7 years. Most children (7 of 23) were injured from the exhaust systems of all-terrain vehicles. The average burn size (5%) was small, but almost two thirds of the burn injuries were full thickness. Of the 23 children, 21 required operative intervention for their burns, with 2 children requiring multiple surgical interventions. The average length of hospital stay was 11 days, and all children, except one who went to a rehabilitation facility, were discharged to home.

CONCLUSIONS

Pediatric health care providers should be aware that exhaust system contact burns in children are not rare events and they do tend to be significant. Surgical consultation should be requested early in the management of these particular burn injuries in children.

[Injury patterns in motorcycle accident victims]

An analysis of the injury patterns presented by inpatients of a government teaching hospital, known as one of the emergency centers of S. Paulo city, Brazil, is given the majority of victims are young, male adults and most of them were later discharged from the hospital. In relation to the injuries the majority of the patients were classified as being of minor injury grade (ISS between 1 and 9) and the most frequent injuries were extremity and pelvic fractures, surface trauma, traumatic brain injury and extremity and pelvic dislocations. Besides extremity and pelvic fractures, the victims who died showed abdominal organ injury and traumatic brain injury and the ISS was over 20. Head injury patients who had a high Glasgow Coma Scale score had a low ISS and vice-versa.

Motorcycling attitudes and behaviours. I. 12 and 13 year old adolescents

The death and serious injury of adolescent motorcyclists is a major public health problem. Effective preventive strategies depend on knowledge about target populations. The attitudes and patterns of exposure to motorcycling of 730 13 year old New Zealand adolescents are described. Fifty-two per cent could ride a motorcycle, a further 13% intended to learn, 22% had driven on-road, and 60% had ridden as pillion passengers on-road. Significantly more males than females were riders (P less than 0.001) and had ridden as pillion passengers (P less than 0.05). More male than female non-riders intended to learn (P less than 0.001). Eighty per cent of the sample recognized road 'accidents' as the main cause of death for their peers, and 31% had known a motorcyclist killed or injured. Seventeen per cent of on-road riders had not worn a helmet when last riding. Few statistically significant differences in risk perception were obtained between males and females or riders and non-riders. Preventive options are discussed.