Farm Injuries

AUTHOR ABSTRACT

Six hundred and fifty-eight patients with serious injuries due to farm accidents, representing a fifth of all the admissions caused by trauma, were treated at the Mary Imogene Bassett Hospital during the years 1929-1948.

Such accidents showed a definite variation in seasonal incidence with a peak during July and August for which haying, repair and construction of buildings, and children at play were largely responsible.

Routine chores were the most dangerous motivating activities throughout the year. Farm animals, tools and machinery contributed their share of injuries in that order. Falls were numerous.

Exactly half the accidents occurred either in the barn or in the barnyard.

Nearly 50 per cent of the patients reached the hospital in two hours.

Fractures comprised approximately a third of the 1527 recorded injuries. Extensive lacerations, divisions of nerves, tendons and blood vessels and partial or complete amputations of extremities were common.

The average period of hospitalization was eighteen and three-tenths days during the first ten years of survey and fourteen and one-tenth days during the second.

The mortality fell from 5.1 per cent in the first decade to 0.8 per cent during the second.

JOURNAL: N Engl J Med. 1950; 243(25): 979-983.

Note: New England Journal of Medicine.

NLOM ID#: No ID #.