Driver Injuries

Cuts and lacerations Soreness and pain Multiple traumatic injuries 

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Zador, P. L. (1991). Alcohol-related relative risk of fatal driver injuries in relation to driver age and sex. Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 52, 302-310. 

Blows, S., S. Ameratunga, R, Q, Ivers, S. K. Lo and R. Norton (2005). Risky driving habits and motor vehicle driver injury. Accid. Anal. Prev., 37,619-624. 

Bunn, T. L., S. Slavova, T. W. Struttmann and S. R. Browning (2005). Sleepiness/fatigue and distraction/inattention as factors for fatal versus nonfatal commercial motor vehicle driver injuries. Accid. Anal Prev., 37, 862-869. 

Svenson, L. and Viden, S., 1994. Accidents involving Volvo trucks resulting in driver injury, and the estimated effect of the SRS airbag, Volvo Truck Corporation, Accident Investigation Report 4, Gothenburg. 

The driver and a bystander were fatally injured by the fire and explosion. Thirty other persons sustained minor injuries, including twenty-four who sustained injuries... 

Examples of actual cases involving alcohol include DWl, motor vehicle accidents (involving alcohol in either pedestrian or driver), rape, personal injury (tripping or falling), burglary, theft, assault, and attempted murder. In many cases, it was necessary to calculate the BAG at the time of the accident or other event that had occurred hours before the breath or blood sample was taken (a process known as back extrapolation ). 

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that over 200,000 automobile crashes are caused by drowsy drivers every year, resulting in over 1,500 deaths, 70,000 injuries, and an estimated 12.5 billion in lost productivity and property loss. The National Sleep Foundation s 2002 Sleep in America poll showed that over half of Americans said they have driven while feeling drowsy, and approximately 17% said they had actually fallen asleep while driving. ... 

Connor J, Norton R, Ameratunga S, Robinson E, Civil I, Dunn R, Bailey J, Jackson R. Driver sleepiness and risk of serious injury to car occupants population based case control study. Br Med J 2002 324(1125) l-5. 

Drowsiness Driving and Automobile Crashes NCSDR/NHTSA Expert Panel on Driver Fatigue and Sleepiness. 1999. (Accessed at www.nhtsa.gov/people/injury/ drowsy drivingl/drowsy.html.)... 

Leveille SG, Buchner DM, Koepsell TD, McCloskey LW, Wolf ME, Wagner EH. Psychoactive medications and injurious motor vehicle collisions involving older drivers. Epidemiology 1994 5 591-598. 

Another method of expressing risk is an index of relative risk. This measure is calculated for a group of workers as the ratio of the rate for that group to the rate for all workers.3 The index of relative risk compares the fatality risk of a group of workers with all workers. For example, the relative risk for truck drivers in Table 1—3 is 5.3, which means that they are roughly five times as likely to have a fatal work injury as the average worker. 

Median days away from work to recuperate is yet another measure that can be used to evaluate dangerous jobs. (Median days is an average such that half of those injured take more than the median days to recuperate while the other half require fewer days.) The median days to recuperate from an injury for the 10 occupations fisted are highest for truck drivers and carpenters, each showing a median of 8 days to recuperate, compared to all workers who had a median of 5 days. 

Several explosive devices have recently been developed to enhance general safety. Some examples are air bags which protect the driver from injury in car collisions, and seatbelt tensioners which, when tied up with the action of an air bag, hold the driver to the seat. Explosives are also used as a source of shock waves in medical equipment for breaking up gall stones in a patient s body. In yet another application, explosives are used to generate shock waves in a patient s body water which are then focused on a kidney stone to break it. 

In a Canadian study of 200 000 automobile drivers, aged 67-84, who were followed from 1990 until they reached age 85, or until they emigrated from Quebec, or until 31 May 1993, those who had been involved in an automobile accident in which one person sustained a physical injury were assessed the controls were a 6% random sample of the others (172). Of 5579 patients 20 had been taking lithium within the year before the index date, 19 of whom had been taking it within 16 days before the accident. This compared with 27 of 13 300 patients in the control group (OR = 1.8) for current lithium use, the odds ratio was 2.08. The data on carbamazepine did not show a raised odds ratio. The authors concluded that elderly patients taking lithium have a two-fold increase... 

What is the most dangerous occupation in the United States Is it truck driver, fisher, or elephant trainer The public frequently asks this question, as do the news media and safety and health professionals. To answer it, BLS used data from its Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) and Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses (SOII). ... 

Analysis of dangerous jobs is not complete, however, unless data on nonfatal job-related injuries and illnesses are examined. Table 1—4 shows those occupations with the largest number of nonfatal injuries and illnesses, along with days away from work to recuperate. This table shows that truck drivers also lead the list for the occupations with the largest number of nonfatal injuries and illnesses. It also shows the chance of incurring an occupational injury or illness which is expressed as the total number of workers in the employment group compared with the number of workers injured in that group. 

For example, the chance of a truck driver having a serious injury is 1 in 15, meaning that for every 15 truck drivers 1 will have a serious injury during the year. But laborers and nursing aides and orderlies have a greater chance of injury or illness than truck drivers (see Table 1- ). 

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