Study: rural children much more likely to be injured by lawn mowers, especially in the South and Midwest - Entrepreneur Generations

More than 9,000 children in the U.S. are treated in emergency rooms for lawn mower-related injuries; a new study suggests that rural children are at the highest risk of getting hurt, especially younger children and those in the South and Midwest, Robert Preidt reports for U.S. News & World Report.

Researchers from the University of Toledo analyzed data on patients under age 18 who were seen for lawn mower injuries at 49 U.S. hospitals from 2005 to 2017. "Rural areas had much higher rates of such injuries, younger patients, and higher rates of amputations, surgical complications and infections," Preidt reports. "Lawn mower-related injuries in rural areas required longer hospital stays, had higher rates of surgical complications (5.5% vs 2.6%), and occurred in younger patients."

Amputation rates for minors with lawn mower-related injuries were 15.5% in rural areas, compared to 9.6% in urban areas. And rural children under age 10 had a higher rate of severe injuries, longer hospital stays, and higher health care costs than older rural minors, Preidt reports.

Overall, rural areas had 7.3 injuries per 100,000 emergency department cases, compared to 1.5 injuries per 100,000 in urban areas. "By region, the highest injury rate was in the South (2.7 injuries per 100,000 cases), followed by the Midwest (2.2 injuries per 100,000 cases) and the Northeast (1.3 injuries per 100,000 cases)," Preidt reports. "The Western United States had the lowest rate at 0.6 injuries per 100,000 cases."

Researcher Ronit Shah, a medical student at the University of Toledo, called for children to receive more education about lawn mower safety, especially in the rural South and Midwest, Preidt reports.

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/331Ia4S Study: rural children much more likely to be injured by lawn mowers, especially in the South and Midwest - Entrepreneur Generations

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