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Objective: To document patterns of water exposure at surf beaches by gender and identify factors that predict bather confidence to return to shore if caught in a rip current. Method: Recreational surf beach bathers (N=406) provided self-completed data on water exposure patterns, surf activity behaviours and potential drowning risk and protective factors. Results: Relative to females, males visited surf beaches more frequently, expected to spend longer in the water and in deeper water, and more often bathed after using alcohol (p Conclusion: The study supports explanations that high male drowning rates result from more frequent exposure to water than females at high situational risk levels. Implications: Controlled studies are required to determine the role in drowning of overconfidence, swimming ability, surf experience, floatation devices and response to sea conditions. Key words: bathing beaches, drowning, environmental exposure, self report.

Objective: Globally in 2000, 1.2 million deaths resulted from road traffic injury (RTI) and about 10 times this number were injured. Because of the size of the problem, its expected growth and its preventability, World Health Day 2004 (April 7) was devoted to RTI. This review highlights attention to RTI by the ANZJPH and investigates relevance to the developing world, where 90% of all RTI deaths now occur. Method: All articles published by the ANZJPH over the five-year period 1999-2004, which met the World Health Organization definition of RTI, were reviewed. Results: The eight studies selected and reviewed focused particularly on young drivers, alcohol use and Indigenous Australians, using a range of research and evaluation methods. Risk factors identified including widespread risky driving behaviour by young males and alcohol involvement. Intervention successes included legislative change regarding utility passengers, current vehicle inspection certificate and effects associated with the lead-up to New Zealand's 1992 Transport Act. Conclusions: The dramatic and continued reduction in Australia's road toll following peak rates in the 1960s has relied on scientific research, such as that reviewed here, for its effective evidence base. This review indicates that RTI is established on the public health agenda in Australia--a key aim of WHO's five-year strategy, for emulation by developing regions and nations. Implications: High-income countries such as Australia and New Zealand have the knowledge, expertise and also the responsibility to assist regional low- and middle-income countries to counter the growing scourge of RTI that accompanies rapid motorisation.

Objective: To estimate the injury hospitalisation trends and the age and gender patterns in Victoria between 1987/88 and 1996/97. Method: The Victorian Injury Surveillance System maintains a collection of injury hospitalisation records in Victoria. We used loglinear models for rates to estimate the temporal trends and patterns by age group and gender of all-injury and cause-specific injury hospitalisation rates. Results: The all-injury hospitalisation rate appeared stable until 1992/93, after which it increased substantially (1993/94 was 1.13 times that of 1987/88). While motor vehicle crash and fire/burn/scald injury hospitalisation rates decreased substantially, suicide attempt and self-inflicted injury hospitalisation rates more than doubled. The all-injury hospitalisation rate was highest for persons 75 years of age and older. Females had a lower all-injury hospitalisation rate than males up to 60-64 years of age and a higher rate thereafter. The cause-specific injury hospitalisation rates showed various age and gender patterns. Conclusion: Substantial increases in the all-injury hospitalisation rate were observed after the introduction of the case-mix funding policy to public hospitals. There were remarkable variations in temporal trend and age and gender patterns of injury hospitalisation rates by cause of injury. Implications: Hospitalised injuries generally are serious and incur high cost. Certain injury causes and age and gender groups should receive particular attention for prevention efforts. The use of injury surveillance based on hospitalisation records should be improved and further expanded.

The article discusses possible intervention strategies for accidental eucalyptus oil poisoning by young children. Potential countermeasures ranged from discontinuing the use of such oil as a therapeutic agent to improving child-resistant closures.

Recent changes to privacy legislation in Australia have resulted in more stringent requirements with respect to maintaining the confidentiality of patient health information. We describe a method employed to de-identify health information collected in a longitudinal study using codes. Using a patient-derived code that did not change during the life of the study follow-up resulted in errors in a quarter of the follow-up surveys. This may introduce bias that could compromise the validity of the study. Alternative methods of coding may alleviate some of these issues. However, removal of some of the constraints imposed by interpretations of privacy legislation may be the best way forward.

Abstract Background To determine factors predicting the duration of time away from work following acute orthopaedic non life threatening trauma Methods Prospective cohort study conducted at four hospitals in Victoria, Australia. The cohort comprised 168 patients aged 18-64 years who were working prior to the injury and sustained a range of acute unintentional orthopaedic injuries resulting in hospitalization. Baseline data was obtained by survey and medical record review. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis was used to examine the association between potential predictors and the duration of time away from work during the six month study. The study achieved 89% follow-up. Results Of the 168 participants recruited to the study, 68% returned to work during the six month study. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis identified that blue collar work, negative pain attitudes with respect to work, high initial pain intensity, injury severity, older age, initial need for surgery, the presence of co-morbid health conditions at study entry and an orthopaedic injury to more than one region were associated with extended duration away from work following the injury. Participants in receipt of compensation who reported high social functioning at two weeks were 2.58 times more likely to have returned to work than similar participants reporting low social functioning. When only those who had returned to work were considered, the participant reported reason for return to work " to fill the day" was a significant predictor of earlier RTW [RR 2.41 (95% C.I 1.35-4.30)] whereas "financial security" and "because they felt able to" did not achieve significance. Conclusions Many injury-related and psycho social factors affect the duration of time away from work following orthopaedic injury. Some of these are potentially modifiable and may be amenable to intervention. Further consideration of the reasons provided by participants for returning to work may provide important opportunities for social marketing approaches designed to alleviate the financial and social burden associated with work disability.

Objective: To examine the evidence base for patterns of oro-facial injuries in physical abuse cases of children and adolescents aged 0-17 years. Data sources: Systematic searches of Ovid Medline, Ovid Embase, Cochrane Central and grey literature, dating from the oldest entry to August 2017. Review methods: Search criteria included English language peer reviewed articles and theses on physical abuse cases affecting the age group of 0-17 years. Exclusion criteria were: Case reports and <10 case series; studies involving bite mark injuries elsewhere on the body, sexual, ritualistic or emotional abuse and neglect, exposure to domestic violence; reviews; book chapters and conference proceedings. The following data was extracted: quality and design of study, oro-facial manifestations, new/old injuries, fatalities, coexistent injuries, co-morbidities and radiologic investigations. Each study was subjected to two independent reviews and a third, if reviewers disagreed. Results: The authors identified 51 articles, 26 of which satisfied the inclusion criteria. The oro-facial signs were superficial injuries of face, ears, neck, lips and oral mucosa, burns, torn fraenii and fractured teeth and jaws. A minority of studies stood out due to their well-developed design; expert opinion inclusion; new/old/occult injury investigations and facial bruising/ intraoral injuries as sentinel markers. Overall, the review demonstrated weak study quality and representativeness as well as lacunae in uniform reporting. Conclusions: The available literature does not endorse any pathognomonic signature patterns of child physical abuse to the exposed oro-facial region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To better address drowning issues, risk assessment at the group and sample levels would be enhanced by precise measures of exposure to water. The aim of the study was to develop and pilot test a method of measuring exposure to water based on estimating immersions for surf bathers. Validated direct observation counts provided peak-bathing period point estimates and a daily bather immersion profile for an identified sampling frame comprising 20 beaches over 39 summer days. An estimated 10,089 water immersions occurred at the peak-bathing period in the sampling frame. Swimmers comprised 86.0% and surfers with equipment 14.0% of the observed bathing sample, respectively. For swimmers only on patrolled beaches, 77.1% bathed in the lifesaver supervised (flag) zones. The study has implications for the provision of organized bather supervision and provides a foundation for generation of hypotheses on the nature of drowning risk for selected surf bather groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]