141st APHA Annual Meeting

In This section

280745
Boarding injuries: The long and short of It

Tuesday, November 5, 2013 : 1:30 PM - 1:45 PM

Leslie Fabian, MMSc, PA-C , Utah Valley Regional Medical Center, Intermountain Health Care, Provo, UT
Steven M. Thygerson, PhD, MSPH, CIH , Department of Health Sciences, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT
Ray M. Merrill, PhD, MPH , Department of Health Science, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT
Background: As the popularity of longboarding increases, trauma centers are treating an increased number of high severity injuries. Current literature lacks descriptions of the types of injuries experienced by longboarders, a distinct subset of the skateboarding culture. Methods: A retrospective review of longboarding and skateboarding injury cases was conducted at a level II trauma center over a five year period. Specific injuries in addition to high injury severity factors were calculated to compare longboarder to skateboarder injuries. Results: A total of 824 patients met the inclusion criteria. Patients ranged in age from 2 to 48 (M = 19.2, SD = 6.1), and 75.2% were male. Severe head fractures, traumatic brain injuries (TBI), and intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) were significantly more common among longboard patients. All patients with an Injury Severity Score above 15 were longboarders. Hospital and Intensive Care Unit length of stay in days was also significantly greater for longboarders compared with skateboarders (p < 0.0001). Longboarders were significantly more likely to have a head fractures, TBI, and ICH than skateboarders (p < 0.0001). Conclusion: Longboard injuries account for a higher incidence rate of head injuries compared to skateboard injuries. Our data show that a higher-than-normal index of suspicion should be maintained when caring for a longboard-injury patient, leading to a lower threshold for neuroimaging studies. Public health campaigns promoting helmet use, while pertinent to both skateboarders and longboarders, may significantly reduce TBI and head fractures when customized to the longboarding population.

Learning Areas:
Assessment of individual and community needs for health education
Clinical medicine applied in public health
Communication and informatics
Conduct evaluation related to programs, research, and other areas of practice
Epidemiology
Public health or related research

Learning Objectives:
Compare specific injuries in addition to high injury severity factors (including hosptial and intensive care unit length of stay, Injury Severity Score, patient treatment options, disposition, outcome) for longboarder and skateboard injuries. Analyze the incidence of head fractures, traumatic brain injuries and intracranial hemorrhage for both longboarders and skateboarders.

Keywords: Injury, Emergency Department/Room

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been the principal or co-principal investigator on multiple projects focusing on motor vehicle, occupational and recreational injury prevention. My scientific interests include the recognition of injury severity through various injury severity factors and the evaluation of occupational injuries through the use of multiple data sets.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 4228.0: Recreational injuries