title: Epidemiological profile of hospitalised injuries among electric bicycle riders admitted to a rural hospital in Suzhou: a cross-sectional study.
abstract: Police reports indicate an increasing burden of electric bike (E-bike) casualties in China; however, hospitalised injury data have not been reported. The aim of the present work was to describe hospitalised injury patterns for E-bikers involved in road crashes and explore injury risk disparities among them. For the period October 2010 to April 2011, this cross-sectional study retrospectively collected information for hospitalised E-bikers involved in road crashes from hospital records, in Suzhou China, using the International Classification of Diseases, 10th revision (ICD-10) injury diagnosis codes. Injury nature and body region were further categorised using ICD-10 codes. Multivariate logistic regression was used to assess the risk of specific injury types. We found that hospitalised E-biker injuries (n=323) accounted for 57.2% of road traffic hospitalisations over the 6-month study period. The average age, length of stay and hospitalisation cost were 43.8 years, 10.0 days and ¥8229 (US$1286), respectively. Fractures and head injuries were common. The odds of traumatic brain injuries were significantly elevated for night-time E-bike crashes and incidents other than colliding with motor vehicles. These findings confirm E-bike injuries as an important population health problem and identify elevated injury odds in different E-biker groups. Future injury prevention initiatives should include encouraging helmet use among E-bikers.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Population Research, Peking University, , Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Du
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Brent
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Powis
authors.forename: Xiaoying
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.forename: Joan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ozanne-Smith
authors.forename: Lynne
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bilston
authors.forename: JingLin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: He
authors.forename: Ting
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.forename: Xiaofei
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Ming
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wu
mesh_terms: D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001642:Bicycling; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006260:Head Protective Devices / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006780:Hospitals, Rural; D006801:Humans; D015601:Injury Severity Score; D007902:Length of Stay; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009049:Motorcycles; D010343:Patient Admission; D010353:Patient Education as Topic; D011159:Population Surveillance; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology