Injury patterns and injury sources of unrestrained and three point belt restrained car occupants in injury producing frontal collisions

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Backaitis, S. H.¹; Dalmotas, D.²

Injury patterns and injury sources of unrestrained and three point belt restrained car occupants in injury producing frontal collisions

29th Annual Proceedings, Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM)

Affiliations

¹National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

²Transport Canada
Abstract

This paper examines injury patterns and injury sources of belted and unbelted front seat car occupants who were involved in injury producing frontal collisions. Canadian restrained occupant injury file (FROS) and 1983 NASS unrestrained occupant subfile were used for this purpose.

The study shows relatively little difference in injury patterns between unrestrained drivers and passengers and rather significant differences between belted drivers and passengers. Injury sources for various occupant body areas are identified on the basis of injury severity. Head injuries caused by various vehicle components are in predominance on unrestrained drivers and passengers and also on belt restrained drivers when accidents are sufficiently severe to produce such injuries.The restrained front seat passenger appears to experience lower head injury frequencies than the restrained driver, but shows higher rates of chest and abdomen injuries. Based on specially selected subsets from both files, the study also shows that restrained drivers receive considerably lower injury severities than their unrestrained counterparts at comparable car crash intensities.

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Cited By (10)

Year	Entry
1991	Fildes BN, Lane JC, Lenard J, Vulcan AP. Passenger Cars and Occupant Injury. Monash University Accident Research Centre, Cr95. Canberra, Australia: Federal Office of Road Safety; March 1991. Report No. CR95.
1987	Green RN, German A, German A, Nowak ES. Case studies of severe frontal collisions involving fully-restrained occupants. In: 31st Annual Proceedings, Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM). September 28-30, 1987; New Orleans, LA.309-323.
1988	Salmi LR, Fabry JJ, Thomas H, Girard R. The importance of background time trends in evaluating seat-belt laws: the French experience. In: 32nd Annual Proceedings, Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM). September 12-14, 1988; Seattle, WA.255-269.
1990	Fildes BN, Vulcan AP, Lenard J. Occupant safety in modern passenger cars. In: 34th Annual Proceedings, Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM). October 1-3, 1990; Scottsdale, AZ.227-251.
1998	Elhagediab AM, Rouhana SW. Patterns of abdominal injury in frontal automotive crashes. In: Proceedings of the 16th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). May 31–June 4, 1998; Windsor, Ontario, Canada.327-337.
2001	Kress TA, Porta DJ. Characterization of leg injuries from motor vehicle impacts. In: Proceedings of the 17th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 4-7, 2001; Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
2013	Shaw G, Lessley D, Ash J, Crandall J, Parent D. Response comparison for the Hybrid III, THOR mod kit with SD-3 shoulder, and PMHS in a simulated frontal crash. In: Proceedings of the 23rd International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). May 27-30, 2013; Seoul, South Korea.
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2012	Ash JH, Lessley DJ, Forman JL, Zhang Q, Shaw CG, Crandall JR. Whole‐body kinematics: response corridors for restrained PMHS in frontal impacts. In: Proceedings of the 2012 International IRCOBI Conference on the Biomechanics of Injury. September 12-14, 2012; Dublin, Ireland.142-154.