The epidemiology of Scottish trauma: A comparison of pre-hospital and in-hospital deaths, 2000 to 2011

AimsTo characterise the temporal trends and urban-rural distribution of fatal injuries in Scotland through the analysis of mortality data collected by the National Records of Scotland.MethodsThe prospectively collected NRS database was queried using ICD-10 codes for all Scottish trauma deaths during the period 2000 to 2011. Patients were divided into pre-hospital and in-hospital groups depending on the location of death. Incidence was plotted against time and linear regression was used to identify temporal trends.ResultsA total of 13,100 deaths were analysed. There were 4755 (36.3%) patients in the pre-hospital group with a median age (IQR) of 42 (28–58) years. The predominant cause of pre-hospital death related to vehicular injury (27.8%), which had a decreasing trend over the study period (p = 0.004). In-hospital, patients had a median age of 80 (58–88) years and the majority (67.0%) of deaths occurred following a fall on the level. This trend was shown to increase over the decade of study (p = 0.020). In addition, the incidence of urban incidents remained static, but the rate of rural fatal trauma decreased (p < 0.001).ConclusionsAround a third of Scottish trauma patients die prior to hospital admission and the predominant mechanism of injury is due to road traffic accidents. This contrasts with in-hospital deaths, which are mainly observed in elderly patients following a fall from standing height. Further research is required to determine the preventability of fatal traumatic injury in Scotland.