Developments in car safety with respect to disability: injury distributions for car occupants in cars from the 80’s and 90’s

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Kullgren, Anders¹; Krafft, Maria¹; Ydenius, Anders¹; Lie, Anders²; Tingvall, Claes²

Developments in car safety with respect to disability: injury distributions for car occupants in cars from the 80’s and 90’s

Proceedings of the 2002 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Impact

Affiliations

¹Folksam Research, Stockholm, Sweden

²Swedish National Road Administration
Abstract and keywords

The aim was to study the influence of new car design on the distribution and disability risk of injuries to different body regions.

The cars were categorised in 5-year periods according to year of introduction. The injuries of 11,535 injured car occupants, as well as 42,228 two-car crashes reported by the police between 1994 and 2000, were used.

Comparing car models introduced in 1980-84 with models introduced in 1995-99 it was found that the proportion of severe injuries (AIS3+) had decreased by 80%. Furthermore, the relative risk of permanent disability and fatality had decreased by 29 %. The disability risk from AIS2+ injuries had decreased by 76%, while an increase of 18% was found for AIS1. Reductions between 70% and 90% were found for injuries to most body regions, except for neck injuries where there was a 14% increase.

The results highlight the need for better injury classification systems, which also take disability risks into account when designing future cars and roads, and that disability risk from AIS1 injuries should be reflected in legislative and consumer crash tests. Such designs and tests should focus on both permanent disability and fatality.

Keywords: disability; disability risk; injury risk; injury distribution; crashworthiness

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Cited By (14)

Year	Entry
2003	Kullgren A, Eriksson L, Boström O, Krafft M. Validation of neck injury criteria using reconstructed real-life rear-end crashes with recorded crash pulses. In: Proceedings of the 18th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). May 19-22, 2003; Nagoya, Japan.
2007	Fréchède B, McIntosh A. Use of MADYMO’s human facet model to evaluate the risk of head injury in impact. In: Proceedings of the 20th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 18-21, 2007; Lyon, France.
2011	Stigson H, Kullgren A, Krafft M. Use of car crashes resulting in injuries to identify system weaknesses. In: Proceedings of the 22nd International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 13-16, 2011; Washington, DC.
2017	Kim S, Park Y, Park W, Lee J, Kang B, Suh M. Consider of occupant injury mitigation through comparision between crash test results in KNCAP and real-world crsah. In: Proceedings of the 25th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 5-8, 2017; Detroit, MI.
2019	Kullgren A, Axelsson A, Stigson H, Ydenius A. Developments in car crash safety and comparisons between results from Euro NCAP tests and real-world crashes. In: Proceedings of the 26th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 10-13, 2019; Eindhoven, Netherlands.
2003	Eriksson L, Kullgren A. Influence of seat geometry and seating posture on NIC_max and N_km AIS 1 neck injury predictability. In: Proceedings of the 2003 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Impact. September 25, 2003; Lisbon, Portugal.217-231.
2006	Stigson H, Ydenius A, Kullgren A. Variation of crash severity and injury risk depending on collisions with different vehicle types and objects. In: Proceedings of the 2006 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Impact. September 20-22, 2006; Madrid, Spain.45-60.
2011	Jonsson B, Krafft M, Kullgren A. Development of Whiplash Associated Disorders for adult and child occupants in cars launched since the 1980s in different impact directions. In: Proceedings of the 2011 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Injury. September 14-16, 2011; Krakow, Poland.62-72.
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2020	Kullgren A, Stigson H, Axelsson A. Developments in car crash safety since the 1980s. In: Proceedings of the 2020 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Injury. 2020; Munich, Germany.86-99.
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2020	Shen D. Investigation of Whiplash Associated Disorders Using Finite Element Neck Models With Active Musculature in Frontal, Rear and Lateral Impact [Master's thesis]. University of Waterloo; 2020.