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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Avicenna J Med 2022; 12(02): 061-066
DOI: 10.1055/s-0042-1748832
Original Article

Characteristics of School Injuries Presenting to the Emergency Department

Serdar Özdemir 
1   Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Health Sciences Ümraniye Training and Research Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey
,
Hatice Şeyma Akça 
2   Department of Emergency Medicine, Karamanoğlu Mehmet Bey University, Karaman, Turkey
,
Abdullah Algın 
1   Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Health Sciences Ümraniye Training and Research Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey
,
Kamil Kokulu 
3   Department of Emergency Medicine, Aksaray University, Aksaray Training and Research Hospital, Aksaray, Turkey
,
Abuzer Özkan 
1   Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Health Sciences Ümraniye Training and Research Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey
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Abstract

Background School injuries account for approximately one-fifth of pediatric injuries. We aimed to investigate the frequency and severity of school injuries among school-aged children and determine clinical diagnoses and surgery requirement data.

Methods In this prospective study, children who were admitted to the emergency department due to school accidents over a 5-month period were included. Demographics, activity during trauma, mechanism of trauma, nature, severity, emergency department outcomes, and surgery requirement were evaluated.

Results The study included a total of 504 school-aged children, of whom 327 (64.9%) were male and 177 (35.1%) were female. Of the children, 426 (84.5%) had no evidence of injury or minor injury, while 78 (15.5%) had moderate or severe injury. There was a statistically significant difference between these two groups in terms of gender (p = 0.031). Of the 78 children with moderate or severe injuries, 45 had extremity fractures, 18 had lacerations, 5 had maxillofacial injuries, 4 had cerebral contusion, 1 had lung contusion, and 1 had cervical soft-tissue damage. Two patients with fractures and two with eyelid lacerations were treated surgically, and four patients with brain contusion were hospitalized for a close follow-up.

Conclusion This study revealed that the most common moderate or severe injuries in school accidents referred to emergency department were distal radius fractures and lacerations.

Keywords

school health - school - child - injury - fracture - lacerations

Availability of Data and Materials

The dataset generated and analyzed during this study is available from the corresponding author.


Informed Consent

Written informed consent was obtained from legal guardian of patient.


Ethical Approval

Ethical approval for this study was obtained from Ümraniye Training and Research Hospital Ethics Committee (approval number: B.10.1. TKH.4.34.H.GP.0.01/112). The study protocol conforms to the ethical guidelines of the 1975 Declaration of Helsinki.


Authors' Contributions

All authors are responsible for conception, design of the study, data collection, data analysis, and assembly. The manuscript was written and approved by all authors




Publication History

Article published online:
20 June 2022

© 2022. Syrian American Medical Society. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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