Evaluation of the Use and Reasons for Not Using a Helmet by Motorcyclists Admitted to the Emergency Ward of Shahid Bahonar Hospital in Kerman

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Abstract

Background:

Motorcycle crashes are the cause of severe morbidity and mortality especially because of head injuries. It seems that wearing a helmet has an effective role in protection against head injuries. Nevertheless, motorcyclists usually have no tendency to wear a helmet when driving in cities and have several reasons for this behavior.

Objectives:

This study aimed to evaluate the use and reasons for not using a helmet by motorcyclists admitted to an emergency ward of a trauma hospital due to accident in Kerman, Iran.

Patients and Methods:

This study was carried out by recoding the opinions of motorcyclists who had been transferred to the emergency ward of Shahid Bahonar Hospital (Kerman/Iran). Since no data was available on the frequency of the use of helmets, a pilot study was carried out and a sample size of 377 was determined for the main study. Then a researcher-made questionnaire was used to investigate the motorcyclists’ reasons for not using a helmet.

Results:

Only 21.5% of the motorcyclists had been wearing helmets at the time of the accident. The most frequent reasons for not using a helmet were the heavy weight of the helmet (77%), feeling of heat (71.4%), pain in the neck (69.4%), feeling of suffocation (67.7%), limitation of head and neck movements (59.6%) and all together, physical discomfort was the main cause of not wearing a helmet during motorcycle rides.

Conclusions:

In general, it appears that it is possible to increase the use of helmets by eliminating its physical problems, and increasing the knowledge of community members in relation to the advantages of helmet use, which will result in a significant decrease in traumas resulting from motorcycle accidents.

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Most cited references 39

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World report on road traffic injury prevention

M. Peden, R Scurfield, D Sleet (2004)

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Helmets for preventing injury in motorcycle riders.

B C Liu, R Ivers, R Norton … (2008)

Motorcycle crash victims form a high proportion of those killed or injured in road traffic crashes. Injuries to the head, following motorcycle crashes, are a common cause of severe morbidity and mortality. It seems intuitive that helmets should protect against head injuries but it has been argued that motorcycle helmet use decreases rider vision and increases neck injuries. This review will collate the current available evidence on helmets and their impact on mortality, and head, face and neck injuries following motorcycle crashes. To assess the effects of wearing a motorcycle helmet in reducing mortality and head and neck injury following motorcycle crashes. We searched the Cochrane Injuries Group Specialised Register, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (The Cochrane Library issue 2, 2007), MEDLINE (up to April 2007), EMBASE (up to April week 16, 2007), CINAHL (January 1982 to February 2003), TRANSPORT (up to issue 12, 2006) (TRANSPORT combines the following databases: Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS) International Transport Research Documentation (ITRD) formerly International Road Research Documentation (IRRD), ATRI (Australian Transport Index) (1976 to Feb 2003), Science Citation Index were searched for relevant articles. Websites of traffic and road safety research bodies including government agencies were also searched. Reference lists from topic reviews, identified studies and bibliographies were examined for relevant articles. We considered studies that investigated a population of motorcycle riders who had crashed, examining helmet use as an intervention and with outcomes that included one or more of the following: death, head, neck or facial injury. We included any studies that compared an intervention and control group. Therefore the following study designs were included: randomised controlled trials, non-randomised controlled trials, cohort, case-control and cross-sectional studies. Ecological and case series studies were excluded. Two authors independently screened reference lists for eligible articles. Two authors independently assessed articles for inclusion criteria. Data were abstracted by two independent authors using a standard abstraction form. Sixty-one observational studies were selected of varying quality. Despite methodological differences there was a remarkable consistency in results, particularly for death and head injury outcomes. Motorcycle helmets were found to reduce the risk of death and head injury in motorcyclists who crashed. From four higher quality studies helmets were estimated to reduce the risk of death by 42% (OR 0.58, 95% CI 0.50 to 0.68) and from six higher quality studies helmets were estimated to reduce the risk of head injury by 69% (OR 0.31, 95% CI 0.25 to 0.38). Insufficient evidence was found to estimate the effect of motorcycle helmets compared with no helmet on facial or neck injuries. However, studies of poorer quality suggest that helmets have no effect on the risk of neck injuries and are protective for facial injury. There was insufficient evidence to demonstrate whether differences in helmet type confer more or less advantage in injury reduction. Motorcycle helmets reduce the risk of death and head injury in motorcycle riders who crash. Further well-conducted research is required to determine the effects of helmets and different helmet types on mortality, head, neck and facial injuries. However, the findings suggest that global efforts to reduce road traffic injuries may be facilitated by increasing helmet use by motorcyclists.

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Building national estimates of the burden of road traffic injuries in developing countries from all available data sources: Iran.

Christopher Murray, Emil Bartels, S Shahraz … (2009)

To use a range of existing information sources to develop a national snapshot of the burden of road traffic injuries in one developing country-Iran. The distribution of deaths was estimated by using data from the national death registration system, hospital admissions and outpatient visits from a time-limited hospital registry in 12 of 30 provinces, and injuries that received no institutional care using the 2000 demographic and health survey. Results were extrapolated to national annual incidence of health burden differentiated by age, sex, external cause, nature of injuries and institutional care. In 2005, 30,721 Iranians died annually in road traffic crashes and over one million were injured. The death rate (44 per 100,000) is the highest of any country in the world for which reliable estimates are available. Road traffic injuries are the third leading cause of death in Iran. While young adults are at high risk in non-fatal crashes, the elderly have the highest total death rates, largely due to pedestrian crashes. While car occupants lead the death count, motorized two-wheeler riders dominate hospital admissions, outpatient visits and health burden. Reliable estimates of the burden of road traffic injuries are an essential input for rational priority setting. Most low income countries are unlikely to have national injury surveillance systems for several decades. Thus national estimates of the burden of injuries should be built by collating information from all existing information sources by appropriately correcting for source specific shortcomings.

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Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Arch Trauma Res

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Arch Trauma Res

Journal ID (doi): 10.5812/atr

Journal ID (publisher-id): Kowsar

Title: Archives of Trauma Research

Publisher: Kowsar

ISSN (Print): 2251-953X

ISSN (Electronic): 2251-9599

Publication date (Electronic): 23 September 2014

Publication date Collection: September 2014

Volume: 3

Issue: 3

Electronic Location Identifier: e19122

Affiliations

[1 ]Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Oral and Dental Diseases Research Center, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, IR Iran

[2 ]Research Center for Health Services Management, Institute for Futures Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, IR Iran

[3 ]Shahid Bahonar Hospital, Kerman, IR Iran

Author notes

[* ]Corresponding author: Mahboobeh Rajabi, Research Center for Health Services Management, Institute for Futures Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, IR Iran. Tel: +98-3432111511, Fax: +98-3432111613, E-mail: address: ma_rajabi_k@ 123456yahoo.com

Article

DOI: 10.5812/atr.19122

PMC ID: 4276706

PubMed ID: 25599066

SO-VID: 8520e56c-34a6-4130-8371-bfc2ced0e607

License:

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits copy and redistribute the material just in noncommercial usages, provided the original work is properly cited.

History

Date received : 13 April 2014

Date revision received : 18 July 2014

Date accepted : 28 August 2014

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Evaluation of the Use and Reasons for Not Using a Helmet by Motorcyclists Admitted to the Emergency Ward of Shahid Bahonar Hospital in Kerman

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Abstract

Background:

Objectives:

Patients and Methods:

Results:

Conclusions:

Related collections

Taxonomic intelligence

Most cited references 39

World report on road traffic injury prevention

Helmets for preventing injury in motorcycle riders.

Building national estimates of the burden of road traffic injuries in developing countries from all available data sources: Iran.

Author and article information

Journal

Affiliations

Author notes

Article

History

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Cited by 9

Most referenced authors 513