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Severe upper extremity injuries in frontal automobile crashes: the effects of depowered airbags
M Virginia Jernigan1, Amber L Rath, Stefan M Duma
1Virginia Tech-Wake Forest, Center for Injury Biomechanics, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA.
Background:
The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of depowered frontal airbags on the incidence of severe upper extremity injuries.
Methods:
The National Automotive Sampling System database files from 1993 to 2000 were examined in a study that included 2,413,347 occupants who were exposed to an airbag deployment in the United States.
Results:
Occupants exposed to a depowered airbag deployment were significantly more likely to sustain a severe upper extremity injury (3.9%) than those occupants exposed to a full-powered airbag deployment (2.5%) (P=.01). Full-powered systems resulted in an injury distribution of 89.2% fractures and 7.9% dislocations compared with depowered systems with 55.3% fractures and 44.3% dislocations.
Conclusions:
Although depowered airbags were designed to reduce the risk of injuries, they appear to have increased the overall incidence of severe upper extremity injuries through a shift from long bone fractures to joint dislocations.
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