title: Factors affecting the times till death of pedestrians killed in road accidents.
abstract: Police reports of fatal pedestrian road accidents in London in 1970-71 have been examined, and the times of death extracted. These have been related to estimated speed of impact, age of injured person and type of striking vehicle. High-impact speed tends to lead to quick death. Age has no statistically significant effect once speed is allowed for, but because a greater proportion of elderly pedestrians are killed by slowly moving vehicles, the elderly on average die later than the young when all speed groups are combined. Type of vehicle also influences time of death, with motor cycles giving rise to later deaths and heavy goods vehicles to quicker ones than do cars.
mesh_terms: D000063:Accidents, Traffic; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001336:Automobiles; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008433:Mathematics; D008875:Middle Aged; D009038:Motion; D012926:Social Control, Formal; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D013997:Time Factors; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000401:mortality*