141st APHA Annual Meeting

In This section

288232
Counting injury deaths: Underlying vs. multiple causes of death mortality data

Monday, November 4, 2013 : 9:30 AM - 9:45 AM

Tsung-Hsueh Lu , Department of Public Health, College of Medicine,, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan
Annjhih Hsiao , Office of Statistics, Department of Health, Taipei, Taiwan
Chuan-Chiang Hsu , Office of Statistics, Department of Health, Taipei, Taiwan
Hua-Chun Peng , Office of Statistics, Department of Health, Taipei, Taiwan
Lea-Hua Chen , Office of Statistics, Department of Health, Taipei, Taiwan
Background/Purpose: Estimation of number of injury deaths might be different according to different definitions. This study aimed to compare the number of injury deaths estimated according to underlying (U) with multiple (M) cause-of-death (COD) mortality data in the United States. Methods: The Multiple-Cause Mortality Files compiled by the National Center for Health Statistics for year 2009 were used to calculate the U/M ratio by different external causes of injury. Results/Outcomes: There were 117,006 unintentional injury deaths according to underlying COD and 149,144 deaths according to multiple COD with a U/M ratio of 78.5%. The U/M ratio was high for deaths from transport injuries (98.4%), exposure to inanimate mechanical forces (96.0%), unintentional drowning and submersion (96.3%), exposure to smoke, fire and flames (95.4%), intentional self-harm (99.7%), and assault (98.6%). On the contrary, the U/M ratio was low for deaths from threats to breathing (28.3%), exposure to forces of nature (60.2%), and complications of medical and surgical care (10.1%). Conclusions: Number of injury deaths estimated according to underlying COD differed greatly with those according to multiple COD in some external causes of injury, such as choking/suffocation and complications of medical and surgical care. To better estimate the number of injury deaths, both underlying and multiple COD mortality data should be used.

Learning Areas:
Advocacy for health and health education
Epidemiology
Public health or related research

Learning Objectives:
Compare the number of injury deaths according to different mortality datasets

Keywords: Injury Prevention, Mortality

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am the professor of epidemilogy and have high interest in improving the use of mortality data for injury prevention.
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.