Unintentional injury mortality trends in children and adolescents in Lithuania between 1971 and 2005

The objectives of the study were to estimate mortality rate trends due to road traffic, drowning and fire/burns in children aged 0-14 years and in adolescents aged 15-19 years in Lithuania between the years 1971-2005. The data were obtained from Statistics Lithuania and the Health Information Centre. Trends were estimated by linear and polynomial regression. The study revealed that the child and adolescent unintentional injury mortality rates show declining trends. For children, the significant decreasing trends of mortality rates due to road traffic, drowning and fire/burns were observed. For adolescents there were significant decreasing trends for drowning deaths, and insignificant decreasing tendencies for deaths from fire/burns. There was an insignificant increased road traffic mortality rate trend for adolescent girls. For the adolescent boys group and for boys and girls together from the beginning of the study period there were increasing trends, followed by declining trends. In the last years, the increase was observed again.