Anatomy of ATV injuries in Central Illinois: Using the Haddon Matrix to further our knowledge

The Haddon matrix is used by injury epidemiologists and presents a concise way to describe/understand components of an injury event. This matrix consists of 3 rows representing time phases (before, during and after incident) intersecting 3 columns representing characteristics of the agent/vector, person and physical/social environments. We use it to better appreciate ATV injuries occurring in children in Central Illinois. In 2003, children under 16 years were involved in 31% of ER visits associated with ATV injuries and accounted for 27% of ATV related deaths. This project, presenting results from two studies, seeks to better understand two key pre-event components: role of ATV dealers in injury prevention and ATV use patterns in children/adolescents. Motorcycle dealers (n=127) who sold ATVs were interviewed via telephone by investigators posing as naïve parents wanting to purchase an ATV for a 13 year old. Over 30% of these calls resulted in the recommendation to purchase an oversized vehicle. Although helmet use was almost universally endorsed (97% of calls), few recommendations for other safety devices were provided. In Study 2, 634 participants from local 4-H Clubs were surveyed. Few (14.6%) had any ATV safety education. Of the 67% who experienced a crash, almost half (44%) were injured. Child ATV use is common in rural populations with most users being adolescent boys with little safety training or helmet use. ATV injury prevention efforts in rural populations should target this group and focus attention on educating dealers to emphasize training and safe riding habits, including appropriately sized vehicles.