A change in road trauma attendances associated with a major campaign to lower the road toll

Objective: To document the patterns of hospital attendances due to road trauma before and after a campaign, which commenced in Victoria in late 1989, to reduce the road toll. Design: A retrospective review of the medical records of all patients presenting to an emergency department as a result of road trauma during June/July of 1989 and the corresponding period in 1990. Setting: Emergency department of a secondary level hospital in the outer eastern suburbs of Melbourne. Patients: Four hundred and twenty five patients presenting during June/July 1989 and 307 patients during June/July 1990. Main results: In the period following the new road toll initiatives, road trauma attendances and admissions dropped significantly. With respect to demographic data and measures of injury type and severity the two groups were similar. Conclusion: The savings to the community and health care system reflected in the observed changes should provide support for continuing campaigns to reduce the incidence of road trauma in Australia. 1992 Australasian College for Emergency Medicine and Australasian Society for Emergency Medicine