Category Archives: Accidents & Violence

3 Million Americans Carry a Loaded Gun Daily

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
“Me holding USP gun” by Nghị Trần is licensed under CC BY 2.0Ali Rowhani-Rahbar, MD, MPH, PhD
Associate Professor, Department of Epidemiology
Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Pediatrics
University of Washington
Seattle, WA 98195

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: The impact of firearm carrying on public health and public safety is a topic of considerable interest in the US.  Nonetheless, contemporary national data on some of the most fundamental questions about the scope of firearm carrying among adults in the US do not exist. We used data collected through a nationally representative survey designed by investigators at Harvard University and Northeastern University and conducted in 2015 to understand why, how frequently, or in what manner (i.e., concealed or openly) US adults carry loaded handguns on their person. We also examined the prevalence of handgun carrying among this group by the stringency of state laws regulating concealed carry permits.
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“Shall Issue” Gun Law States Associated With Higher Homicide and Firearm Death Rates

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Michael Siegel, MD, MPH Professor, Department of Community Health Sciences Boston University School of Public Health Boston, MA 02118

Prof. Siegel

Michael Siegel, MD, MPH
Professor, Department of Community Health Sciences
Boston University School of Public Health
Boston, MA 02118

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?

Response: A central question in the debate about public policies to reduce firearm violence is whether easier access to concealed handguns increases or decreases the rate of firearm-related homicides. Previous studies on the impact of concealed carry permitting laws have yielded inconsistent results. Most of these studies were conducted more than a decade ago. This study provided a reexamination of this research question with more recent data, up to and including the year 2015.

While all states allow certain persons to carry concealed handguns, there are 3 major variations in permitting policy. In 9 states, law enforcement officials have wide discretion over whether to issue concealed carry permits; these are referred to as “may issue” states because police chiefs can deny a permit if they deem the applicant to be at risk of committing violence, even if there is not a criminal history. In 29 states, there is little or no discretion; these are referred to as “shall-issue” states because permits must be issued if requisite criteria are met. In an additional 12 states, no permit is necessary to carry a concealed handgun.

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Men and Women May Take Different Kinds Of Risks

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dr. Thekla Morgenroth
Preferred pronouns: They/them/their
Research Fellow in Social and Organisational Psychology
Psychology
University of Exeter
Washington Singer Laboratories,
Exeter UK 

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: Risk-taking is often seen as an important trait that leads to economic success – for example when it comes to investing money – and career success. For example, we often hear that leaders need to be willing to take risks. Risk-taking is also strongly associated with masculinity, which leads to the idea that maybe gender differences in economic and career success can be explained by the fact that women are just too risk averse. When you look at the risk-taking literature, it appears that there is support for this idea with many studies showing that men do indeed take more risks than men.

Our research questions these ideas. We show that current measures of risk-taking are biased. They focus only on stereotypical “masculine” risk taking behaviors such as betting your money on the outcome of a sporting event or going whitewater rafting, and ignore the many risks that women take, such as going horseback riding or donating a kidney to a family member. When this bias is addressed, gender differences in risk-taking disappear or even reverse.

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Almost $3 Billion Spent Per Year On Injuries From Firearms

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Faiz Gani MD
Postdoctoral research fellow
Department of Surgery
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Baltimore, Maryland

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: The current study sought to evaluate epidemiological trend in emergency department (ED) visits for firearm-related injuries in the US.

In our study, we observed that 25.3 patients per 100,000 presented to the ED for a firearm-related injury. This translated to over 78,000 ED visits per year.

Over time, while firearm injuries decreased from 2006-2013, an increase in the incidence of firearm-related injuries was observed in 2014.

Additionally, over time injuries among older patients and those injured in an unintentional firearm injury increased. Injuries due to an assault decreased over time.

The average ED and inpatient charges were $5,254 and $95,887, respectively, resulting in an overall financial burden of approximately $25 billion over the study or an annual $2.8 billion in ED and inpatients charges.

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Over One Million Stair-Related Injuries Treated in ERs Each Year

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Gary Smith, MD, DrPH Director, Center for Injury Research and Policy Nationwide Children’s Hospital Columbus, OH

Dr. Smith

Gary Smith, MD, DrPH
Director, Center for Injury Research and Policy
Nationwide Children’s Hospital
Columbus, OH

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?

Response: Previous studies have documented the frequency and characteristics of stair-related injuries among children and older adults. Numerous studies have examined gait characteristics of different age groups and their relationship to falls. In addition, it is estimated that the direct medical and indirect costs of non-fatal stair-related injuries are $92 billion annually in the US.

The current study investigates the epidemiological characteristics of stair-related injuries among all ages using a nationally representative sample over a multi-year period. Our study also expands upon prior research on this topic to investigate the mechanisms of stair-related injuries and examine trends.

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Requiring Some Firearms To Be Surrendered May Reduce Domestic Homicides

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Professor Michael Siegel, MD, MPH Department of Community Health Sciences Boston University School of Public Health Boston, MA 02118

Dr. Siegel

Professor Michael Siegel, MD, MPH
Department of Community Health Sciences
Boston University School of Public Health
Boston, MA 02118

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: Each year, more than 1,800 people in the U.S. are killed by their intimate partners. Approximately half of these homicides are committed using firearms. While federal law prohibits people subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms, there is no requirement that they surrender guns already in their possession.

To close this loophole, several states have enacted laws that not only prohibit gun possession by people subject to restraining orders, but which also explicitly require that they relinquish weapons that they already have.

In this study, we investigated the impact of state domestic violence-related firearm laws and rates of intimate partner homicide, using data from all 50 states over a 25-year period, 1991-2015.

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IED Injuries Even Worse Than Landmines

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Dr. Vivian Mcalister, M.B., CCFP(C), FRCSC, FRCS(I), FACS Professor - Department of Surgery London Health Sciences Centre University Hospital London, Ontario, Canada

Dr. McAlister

Dr. Vivian Mcalister, M.B., CCFP(C), FRCSC, FRCS(I), FACS
Professor – Department of Surgery
London Health Sciences Centre
University Hospital
London, Ontario, Canada

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: This study was performed by medical and nursing officers who were all deployed to the war zone. We were deeply concerned about the type of injuries we were seeing. They were more awful than any we had seen before. We were familiar with reviews of antipersonnel landmine injuries that were reported by Red Cross surgeons in the 1990s. The injuries that we were dealing with were from antipersonnel IEDs more than landmines. We decided to do a formal prospective study for two reasons: first was to carefully describe the pattern of injury so we could develop new medical strategies, if possible, to help victims. The second reason was to catalogue these injuries so we could impartially and scientifically report what we were witnessing.

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U.S. Army Administrative Data Can Be Used To Predict Sexual Assault Perpetration

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Anthony J. Rosellini, Ph.D. Research Assistant Professor Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences Boston University Boston, MA 02215

Dr. Rosellini

Anthony J. Rosellini, Ph.D.
Research Assistant Professor
Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders
Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences
Boston University
Boston, MA 02215

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: Sexual assault among service members is a significant concern of the Department of Defense (DoD) and U.S. Army. Although the annual rate of sexual assault among soldiers is believed to be decreasing, there have also been increases in the number of victims coming forward to report their experiences. The DoD and Army have responded by creating a framework of universal prevention in which all soldiers are required to participate in relatively brief programs aimed at decreasing rates of sexual assault. More intensive preventive interventions could be required, but would only be cost-effective if targeted at a subset of soldiers who are most likely to perpetrate sexual assault.

The goal of this study was to use DoD and U.S. Army administrative records that are available for all soldiers to develop prediction models for sexual assault perpetration. We used the records from all 821,807 male soldiers who served between 2004 and 2009 to develop separate models to predict assaults directed against within-family and non-family adults and minors.
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Pubic Hair Grooming–Related Injuries Surprisingly Common

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Thomas W. Gaither, BS
Department of Urology
University of California, San Francisco
General Hospital, San Francisco

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: We study genitourinary trauma and reconstruction. This study was motivated from a previous study showing that Emergency Room visits due to grooming were increasing over the past nine year. We sought to better characterize who was at most risk for grooming injuries. We found that grooming is extremely common in both men and women and minor injuries occur in about 25% of groomers. Surprisingly, a little over one percent sought medical care due to their injury. Participants at most risk our those who remove all of their pubic hair frequently ( as opposed to those who just trim). We did not find any instruments that were necessarily putting participants at risk for injury.

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Alzheimer’s: Antidepressants Increase Risk of Head and Traumatic Brain Injuries

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:

Heidi Taipale, PhD Pharm Senior Researcher School of Pharmacy, University of Eastern Finland; and Department of Clinical Neuroscience Karolinska Institutet 

Dr. Taipale

Heidi Taipale, PhD Pharm
Senior Researcher
School of Pharmacy, University of Eastern Finland; and
Department of Clinical Neuroscience
Karolinska Institutet 

MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?

Response: Antidepressant use among older persons has been associated with an increased risk of falling and fall-related events, such as hip fractures, in previous studies. Our previous study identified risk of hip fractures in antidepressant among persons with Alzheimer’s disease. As falling is the main causal factor for head traumas and traumatic brain injuries among older persons, we hypothesized that antidepressant use could also be associated with these injuries.

We utilized a nationwide cohort of 70,718 persons newly diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, identified from the Finnish registers. The risk of head injuries and traumatic brain injuries was compared between persons initiating antidepressant use and comparison persons of the same age, gender and time since they received diagnoses of Alzheimer’s disease but not using antidepressants. We found a 40-percent increased risk of head injuries and 30-percent increased risk of traumatic brain injuries associated with antidepressant use. Antidepressant use was associated with a higher risk of head injuries especially at the beginning of use – during the first 30 days – but the risk persisted even longer, up to two years. The association was also confirmed in a study design comparing time periods within the same person, thus eliminating selective factors. Continue reading →