The burden of unintentional drowning: global, regional and national estimates of mortality from the Global Burden of Disease 2017 Study (original) (raw)
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Background: Drowning is a leading and preventable cause of death that has suffered an attention deficit. Improving drowning data in countries would assist the understanding of the full extent and circumstances of drowning, to target interventions and evaluate their effectiveness. The World Health Organization identifies data collection as a key strategy underpinning effective interventions. This study compares unintentional fatal drowning data collection, management and comparison using the databases of Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Methods: Cases of fatal unintentional drowning between 1-January-2005 and 31-December-2014 were extracted. Cases were combined into a single dataset and univariate and chi square analysis (p < 0.01) were undertaken. Location and activity variables were mapped and combined. Variables consistently collected across the three countries were compared to the ILCOR Drowning Data Guideline. The authors also recommend variables for a minimum core dataset. Results: Of 55 total variables, 19 were consistent and 13 could be compared across the three databases. When mapped against the ILCOR Drowning Data Guideline, six variables were consistently collected by all countries, with five compared within this study. The authors recommend a minimum core dataset of 11 variables including age, sex, location, activity, date of incident, and alcohol and drug involvement). There were 8176 drowning deaths (Australia 34.1%, Canada 55.9%, New Zealand 9.9%). All countries achieved reductions in crude drowning rates (Australia − 10.2%, Canada − 20.4%, New Zealand − 24.7%). Location and activity prior to drowning differed significantly across the three countries. Beaches (X 2 = 1151.0;p < 0.001) and ocean/ harbour locations (X 2 = 300.5;p < 0.001) were common in Australia and New Zealand, while lakes/ponds (X 2 = 826.5; p < 0.001) and bathtubs (X 2 = 27.7;p < 0.001) were common drowning locations in Canada. Boating prior to drowning was common in Canada (X 2 = 66.3;p < 0.001).
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2017
Limited research considers change over time for drowning mortality among individuals under 20 years of age, or the sub-cause (method) of those drownings. We assessed changes in under-20 drowning mortality from 2000 to 2013 among 21 countries. Age-standardized drowning mortality data were obtained through the World Health Organization (WHO) Mortality Database. Twenty of the 21 included countries experienced a reduction in under-20 drowning mortality rate between 2000 and 2013, with decreases ranging from −80 to −13%. Detailed analysis by drowning method presented large variations in the cause of drowning across countries. Data were missing due to unspecified methods in some countries but, when known, drowning in natural bodies of water was the primary cause of child and adolescent drowning in Poland (56-92%), Cuba (53-81%), Venezuela (43-56%), and Japan (39-60%), while drowning in swimming pools and bathtubs was common in the United States (26-37%) and Japan (28-39%), respectively. We recommend efforts to raise the quality of drowning death reporting systems and discuss prevention strategies that may reduce child and adolescent drowning risk, both in individual countries and globally.
The epidemiology of drowning in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review
BMC public health, 2017
According to the World Health Organization, drowning is the 3rd leading cause of unintentional injury-related deaths worldwide, accounting for 370,000 annual deaths and 7% of all injury-related deaths. Low- and middle-income countries are the most affected, accounting for 91% of unintentional drowning deaths. The authors performed a systematic review of literature indexed in EMBASE, PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, and Traumatology journals formerly indexed in PubMed in January 2014 and again in September 2016. Abstracts were limited to human studies in English, conducted in low- and middle-income countries, and containing quantitative data on drowning epidemiology. A total of 62 articles met inclusion criteria. The majority of articles originate from Asia (56%) and Africa (26%). Risk factors for drowning included young age (<17-20 years old), male gender (75% vs. 25% female), rural environment (84% vs. 16% urban), occurring in the daytime (95% vs. 5% night time), lack o...
A Hidden Pandemic: The World Drowning Crisis
In the developed world, a sedentary life style has increased over the last century, leading to increased need for exercise, including aquatic activities, to maintain a healthy lifestyle. This may inevitably cause an increase in drowning deaths. The burden of drowning is seriously underestimated for various reasons in terms of injury epidemiology and as a result this causes several negative social, financial, legal, psychological consequences. This review aims to examine this drowning pandemic, its consequences for casualties, rescuers and the society, to raise questions that are posed by its consequences, and to suggest possible answers that may resolve the problem.
Unintentional drowning mortality in China, 2006–2013
Injury Prevention, 2018
background Epidemiological characteristics and recent trends in unintentional drowning at the national level in China are unreported. Methods Using data from the Disease Surveillance Points system, the overall, sex-, location-, age-and cause-specific age-standardised mortality from unintentional drowning in China were calculated and compared. Linear regression was used to examine the significance of mortality trend changes over time. results The average mortality was 4.05 per 100 000 persons between 2006 and 2013. Men and rural residents had much higher drowning mortality rates than women and urban residents at all time points. Drowning following a fall into natural water was the most common mechanism (46% of all drowning deaths). The overall drowning mortality rate remained stable for all subgroups except for distinct decreases in urban residents, children aged 5-9 years, and other specified and unspecified drowning (−10%, −36% and −25%, respectively). Conclusions The overall drowning mortality rate remained high and stable in China between 2006 and 2013. Effective prevention measures like removing or covering water hazards, wearing personal floatation devices, supervision of children, and teaching survival swimming and resuscitation skills should be implemented nationwide.
BMJ open, 2017
Fatal drowning estimates using a single underlying cause of death (UCoD) may under-represent the number of drowning deaths. This study explores how data vary by International Classification of Diseases (ICD)-10 coding combinations and the use of multiple underlying causes of death using a national register of drowning deaths. An analysis of ICD-10 external cause codes of unintentional drowning deaths for the period 2007-2011 as extracted from an Australian total population unintentional drowning database developed by Royal Life Saving Society-Australia (the Database). The study analysed results against three reporting methodologies: primary drowning codes (W65-74), drowning-related codes, plus cases where drowning was identified but not the UCoD. Australia, 2007-2011. Unintentional fatal drowning cases. The Database recorded 1428 drowning deaths. 866 (60.6%) had an UCoD of W65-74 (accidental drowning), 249 (17.2%) cases had an UCoD of either T75.1 (0.2%), V90 (5.5%), V92 (3.5%), X38...
Epidemiological profile of drowning deaths: a cross sectional study
Egyptian Journal of Forensic Sciences
Background: World Health Organization described, drowning as serious and neglected public health problem. Near about 42 people every hour and 3.7 lakh every year die from drowning in the world. In India out of total cases of unnatural deaths 9.4% were died due to drowning, this was the second most common after road traffic accidents. Method: The present study was undertaken at tertiary care hospital government medical college and hospital located in central India on dead bodies brought for postmortem. The study was carried out during the period of December 2013 to November 2015 on 176 cases, to study the various epidemiological parameters of drowning. Result and conclusions: We have concluded that 72.02% victims were male and 28.98% were female, with ratio 2.45: 1, drowning deaths were most commonly seen in age groups of 21-30 years (27.84%). Married population constitutes 46.59% and remaining 32.95% were unmarried. Maximum number of drowning deaths had occurred in urban region constituting 57.38% cases followed by rural region constituting 42.62% cases. Students were the victim seen in 18.75% cases, Hindu community contributed to maximum number of cases with 60.23% cases, number of victims of drowning deaths belong to upper-lower class with 35.23% cases. In drowning deaths 21.02% of victims had familial and financial problems and depression in 20.45% cases, chronic alcoholism in 18.18% cases. The number of drowning deaths occurred in rainy season was (43.75%). Most of the drowned victims were retrieved from lakes (44.32%), wells (34.66%), rivers (8.52%) and ponds (5.68%).
BMJ Open
ObjectivesThe epidemiology of fatal drowning is increasingly understood. By contrast, there is relatively little population-level research on non-fatal drowning. This study compares data on fatal and non-fatal drowning in Australia, identifying differences in outcomes to guide identification of the best practice in minimising the lethality of exposure to drowning.DesignA subset of data on fatal unintentional drowning from the Royal Life Saving National Fatal Drowning Database was compared on a like-for-like basis to data on hospital separations sourced from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s National Hospital Morbidity Database for the 13-year period 1 July 2002 to 30 June 2015. A restrictive definition was applied to the fatal drowning data to estimate the effect of the more narrow inclusion criteria for the non-fatal data (International Classification of Diseases (ICD) codes W65-74 and first reported cause only). Incidence and ratios of fatal to non-fatal drowning wi...
Medical Archives, 2022
Background: According to the World Health Organization (WHO), drowning is globally considered as one of the leading causes of injury related deaths. Defined as the process of experiencing respiratory impairment from submersion in a liquid medium. Drowning is a public health concern in Jordan. This study aimed to investigate drowning incident data from the Forensic Medicine Teaching Centre in the North of Jordan for the purpose of defining high risk groups and circumstances around drowning fatalities which suffered an attention deficit. Objective: The study aims to describe the rate of fatal drowning in North of Jordan and to properly understand the risk factors associated with it. Methods: The present study is retrospective, based on investigating 2808 autopsy reports and selecting only 85 drowning related death reports conducted through a 5 year period (2015-2019) in the Forensic Medicine Teaching Centre which serves Northern Jordan including Irbid, Jarash, Ajloun, and Al-Mafraq. The statistical analysis of fatal drowning cases included the following risk variables: Age, gender, month, year, nationality, address, alcohol and drug consumption. Results: 15 variables were consistent and analyzed across the database of this study. The high risk groups and patterns were identified and the majority of fatal drowning cases were related to males (80.4%). Age group from (2 to 27 years of age were included in the highrisk groups with (88.2%) of all cases. Specifically, the age 2 had the highest occurring frequency. While (17.6%) of drowning fatalities occurred in August. Alcohol and drugs had no significant impact on increasing drowning rates. The dominant manner of death among all cases was accidental (95.3%). Fatal drowning rates were decreasing throughout the years of (2015-2019). Conclusion: Defining drowning high risk groups and its epidemiology helps to overcome this preventable cause of death. The current study highlights the necessity for the need of further interventions to be actively fixed into policies and educational programs and emphasize safety precautions during water activities and to improve the dataset collection for better planning of prevention strategies.