A longitudinal study of injury morbidity in an African-American population

Intentional interpersonal injury appears to be the most common cause of injury in African Americans in western Philadelphia, PA. Emergency department records from 1987 through 1990 were reviewed from hospitals in a predominantly African-American neighborhood in Philadelphia. A total of 46,260 injuries occurred during the four-year study. There were 403 deaths and 2,796 hospital admissions. Slightly more than 23% of all injuries were intentional interpersonal injuries. Almost 41% of men between 20 and 29 years old visited a hospital emergency room at least once as a result of an intentional interpersonal injury. Slightly more than 21% of the women in the same age group visited an emergency room because of an intentional interpersonal injury. During the course of the study intentional gun-related injuries increased by 179%.
Objective. - To improve understanding of the patterns of injury morbidity and mortality in an urban African-American population. Design. - Prospective survey of emergency department records for a geographically defined population from 1987 through 1990. Setting. - Eleven hospital emergency departments in Philadelphia, Pa. Participants. - The approximately 6 8000 people living in 17 census tracts in western Philadelphia. Results. - A total of 46 260 injury events were identified in the survey (168.8 events per 1000 population annually). Half of the population made an emergency department visit for one or more injuries during the 4 years of study. There were 2796 hospital admissions (10.2/1000 population) and 403 deaths (1.5/1000 population) as a result of these injuries. Although in 1987 falls were the most frequent type of injury resulting in an emergency department visit, by 1989 the number of interpersonal intentional injury events exceeded the number of falls. Interpersonal intentional injuries accounted for 31.2% of hospital admissions and 42.7% of deaths. Of men 20 through 29 years old, 94.3% visited an emergency department at least once in the 4 years because of an injury, and 40.9% of men in this age group sought treatment for one or more interpersonal intentional injuries. The likelihood of future interpersonal intentional injury-related visits increased with the number of previous injuries of this type. Conclusions. - Interpersonal intentional injury occurs frequently in this population. More attention needs to be paid to prevention and intervention to reduce the toll of this violence. The high prevalence of injury in certain age strata may make general, population-based efforts for injury prevention more efficient than efforts targeted to subgroups.