Philadelphia, Pa.-- Researchers at The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia have found that children who ride inside compact extended cab pickup trucks are at a greater risk of injury than children riding in other vehicles. Findings of the study are published in the March 6 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
The research is the first ever to measure the risk to children inside compact extended cab pickup trucks. We found that children riding in the rear seat of compact extended cab pickup trucks were nearly five times more likely to suffer injury during a crash compared to children riding in the rear seat of other vehicles, says Flaura Koplin Winston, M.D., Ph.D., lead author of the JAMA paper and principal investigator of the Partners for Child Passenger Safety, a study funded by State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company.
Our findings indicate that compact extended cab pickup trucks are not optimal vehicles for transporting children, said Dr. Winston. We encourage families who own them to avoid transporting children in them and to find other forms of transportation. Seventy-five percent of all State Farm policyholders who own compact extended cab pickup trucks insure a second vehicle, indicating most families have alternative vehicles.
The study sample represented 110,423 children involved in 71,229 crashes from December 1998 to November 2000 reported to State Farm, Childrens Hospitals partner in the Partners for Child Passenger Safety project. The on-going partnership focuses on identifying key issues pertaining to how and why children are injured or killed in car crashes and offers viable recommendations based on the science.
The increased risk of injury is caused by contact with the interior of the vehicle at impact, says Dennis Durbin, M.D., co-principal investigator of Partners for Child Passenger Safety and co-author of the study. The rear seat of an extended cab pickup truck presents un
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Contact: Suzanne Hill
hillsu@email.chop.edu
215-590-1417
Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
5-Mar-2002