Unintentional injuries at school in China--patterns and risk factors.
OBJECTIVE
To describe the rate and pattern of unintentional school injuries among primary and middle school students and to explore the major risk factors involved.


METHODS
A cross-sectional survey of more than 10,000 students attending 6 primary and 4 middle schools selected randomly from all schools in Maanshan City of Anhui Province in eastern China was conducted to collect information on school injuries occurring in the 12-month period before the survey. Rate ratios for risk factors were estimated using the negative binomial regression analysis.


RESULTS
The annual person-based school injury rate was 5.22 (95% CI: 3.90-6.53) percent. The annual event-based injury rate was 5.40 (95% CI: 4.04-6.76) per 100 students. Most injuries in school were relatively mild and only 1.53% (9/590) of the episodes resulted in hospitalization. The most frequent injures were falls (73%), and the most commonly injured sites were the upper limbs (46%). Male sex, primary school grades, poor health status, poor ability to concentrate, bad risk-taking behavior and high study-related stress were important risk factors.


CONCLUSIONS
This study provided useful baseline information on school injuries in China and identified important risk factors that would be important in planning prevention strategies.
Sun
Ye-Huan
YH
Department of Community and Family Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 4th Floor, School of Public Health, Prince of Wales Hospital, N.T., Hong Kong SAR, PR China.
Yu
Ignatius Tak-Sun
IT
Wong
Tze-Wai
TW
Zhang
Yan
Y
Fan
Ya-Ping
YP
Guo
Shu-Qin
SQ
D000056:Accident Prevention; D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012307:Risk Factors; D013334:Students / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control