Road traffic injury deaths and correlates in babylon province: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background: Road traffic accidents were a major health problem especially in low and middle income countries including Iraq, head injuries were found to be the most common fatal injuries during traffic accidents that causing deaths. Objectives: to identify the relationship of road traffic injury deaths with different associated factors and to measure the extent of this problem. Methodology: this was a cross-sectional study included a retrospective analysis of the forensic medicine data presented in the records of forensic medicine department for three years (2017-2019) the period needed to conduct this study started from 1st of February to the end of November,2019 . After the approval of the study protocol by the Babylon nursing college health ethical committee, a semi structured questionnaire was used to collect data according to the descriptive epidemiologic model (person, place, time). Results: The road traffic accidents death rate in Babylon province was unacceptably high, the mean deaths per month due to Road Traffic Injuries was 43,8 and the mean deaths per week was11victims and the crude death rate =27/100000 population; Males in their productive age group were outnumbered victims to this preventable high priority health problem. Urgent interventional plan of action including provision high quality nursing tertiary care should be started to address this growing problem using the available resources to promote the critical care skills among health care providers and to reduce medical errors.