A Study on Injury Prediction Method and Influential Factors in Side Impact Crashes Using Accident Data

The incidence of traffic accidents in patients with chronic liver disease (CLD) is high in the USA. However, the characteristics of patients, including dietary habits, differ between Japan and the USA. The present study investigated the incidence of traffic accidents in CLD patients and the clinical profiles associated with traffic accidents in Japan using a data-mining analysis. A cross-sectional study was performed and 256 subjects [148 CLD patients (CLD group) and 106 patients with other digestive diseases (disease control group)] were enrolled; 2 patients were excluded. The incidence of traffic accidents was compared between the two groups. Independent factors for traffic accidents were analyzed using logistic regression and decision-tree analyses. The incidence of traffic accidents did not differ between the CLD and disease control groups (8.8 vs. 11.3%). The results of the logistic regression analysis showed that yoghurt consumption was the only independent risk factor for traffic accidents (odds ratio, 0.37; 95% confidence interval, 0.16-0.85; P=0.0197). Similarly, the results of the decision-tree analysis showed that yoghurt consumption was the initial divergence variable. In patients who consumed yoghurt habitually, the incidence of traffic accidents was 6.6%, while that in patients who did not consume yoghurt was 16.0%. CLD was not identified as an independent factor in the logistic regression and decision-tree analyses. In conclusion, the difference in the incidence of traffic accidents in Japan between the CLD and disease control groups was insignificant. Furthermore, yoghurt consumption was an independent negative risk factor for traffic accidents in patients with digestive diseases, including CLD.

Trends of traffic fatalities and DNA analysis in traffic accident investigation

This study examines the relationship between age and the injury outcomes for belted drivers in road vehicle crashes in the United Kingdom. The sample of 1,541 drivers was divided into three age groups: 889 drivers were aged 17–39 years (young drivers); 515 were 40–64 years (middle-aged), and 137 aged 65–84 years (older drivers). Both frontal and side impact crashes in which the vehicles sustained sufficient damage to be towed away from the scene are considered. In-depth information obtained from examinations of the crashed vehicles was combined with clinical data obtained from hospitals to throw light on the mechanisms that led to the injuries. Results show that in crashes of approximately equal severity, older drivers were significantly more likely than middle-aged and young drivers to be fatally injured in both frontal (p<0.001) and side (p<0.05) impact crashes. The results also show that older drivers sustained more injuries to the chest (p<0.0001) and that this body region is particularly problematic. The main sources of the chest injuries were found to be the seat belt in frontal crashes and the door in side impact crashes. As the number of older car users will increase rapidly in most OECD countries in the coming decades, the results suggest that vehicle re-designs are required, including in-vehicle crashworthiness systems, to take into account older people's relatively low tolerance of crash impacts.

<div class="htmlview paragraph">The relationship between car size and occupant injury is examined using traffic accident data from all over Japan. For head-on collisions, the occupant injury rate is formulated based on the approximation of occupant injury by delta-V. The effects on occupant injury of the sizes of the striking and struck vehicles, as well as the effects of seat belt use and vehicle velocity, are examined in head-on, side-impact and single-car collisions.</div> <div class="htmlview paragraph">As occupant injuries are also influenced by the other car or cars involved in a collision, the number and size distribution of vehicles is important. Sensitivity analysis shows that the effect of the number of lighter cars is greater in head-on collisions and that the effect of the number of heavier cars is greater in side-impact collisions, relative to the total number of fatalities.</div>

Automobile accidents have kept on increasing year after year in postwar Japan as motorization has continued to progress. Though the annual totals of deaths and injuries reached a peak in 1970 and then started to decline (see Table 1), the National Police Agency reported 7.6 deaths per 100,000 of population and 516 injuries in automobile accidents during 1975. (It may be noted that the number of deaths tends to be underestimated by by the police.) Compared to other countries, Japan's automobile death rate per 100,000 of population is not particularly high. The number of deaths per 10,000 cars in Japan exceeded the numbers in other countries in 1970 but came closer to the latter in 1973 (see Table 2). Of automobile accidents by type, deaths of pedestrians and cyclists comprise 48 per cent of all deaths, in contrast to only 19 percent in the United States (see Table 3). (1) Needless to say, the distressing increase of traffic accidents is raising numerous social problems. (2)

It is the most important special characteristic that ships all have to hold the ability to complete their navigations by themselves, and it is defined as "the self-completion ability" in this paper. The purposes of this paper are to investigate the values of varying quantities of ship's self-completion ability on the marine traffic accidents in Japan, and for a premise, to introduce the new function for rating this ability. The new function is composed of the transition ratio from the lower level damage or risk to the higher, and the levels are arranged in a series on the process of traffic accident. The numerical values of this ability are obtained by the statistical data of all the casualties and the marine accidents requiring rescue in the latter half of the twentieth century in Japan. In consequence of these numerical results, this paper points out the average of the self-completion ability at the low level risk is improving after the 1970's but the ability at the higher is not very much change during the past about 50 years, and therefore, it is necessary to improve the ability obstructing transition to the higher level risk.

Analysis of emergency survival rate after traffic accidents in Japan

Road traffic safety: An analysis of the cross-effects of economic, road and population factors

<div class="section abstract"><div class="htmlview paragraph">A vehicle-to-vehicle communication system (V2V) sends and receives vehicle information by wireless communication and assists safe driving. The present study investigated the activation timings of collision information support, collision caution support, and collision warning support provided by a V2V in an experiment using a driving simulator for four situations of (1) assistance in braking, (2) assistance in accelerating, (3) assistance in making a right turn, and (4) assistance in making a left turn at a blind intersection. The four situations are common scenarios of traffic accidents in Japan. Safety margins for collision information support and collision warning support were the time required for the driver to fully apply the brake pedal, while the safety margin for collision caution support was the time required for the driver to begin applying the brake pedal. The study investigated the effects of adding safety margins to standard activation timings. The standard activation timings referred to activation timings defined by V2V guidelines of the Japanese Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. The effects of new activation timings were investigated in the experiment. Objective (based on the use of the accelerator and braking pedals) and subjective evaluations were made of the activation timings. As result, in the case of collision warning support, the appropriate activation timing of V2V is 2.0 s in all experimental conditions. The timing of 2.0 s means that the safety margin is added twice to the standard activation timing. The collision caution support has appropriate activation timing if the safety margin is added once to the standard activation timing under several experimental conditions. In the case of collision information support, the appropriate activation timing was the addition of one safety margin to the standard activation timing in all experimental conditions.</div></div>

Evaluation of vehicle side airbag effectiveness in Victoria, Australia

<div class="htmlview paragraph">The introduction of the dynamic FMVSS 214 crash test requirement has prompted the need for an economical test method for the development of side impact occupant protection devices. Full scale side impact crash testing is too costly for the development testing of occupant protection components.</div> <div class="htmlview paragraph">This paper describes a unique test method for side impact sled testing which utilizes a standard 12-inch HYGE type sled facility. It has been demonstrated, with several hundred tests, to provide high repeatability and good correlation with full vehicle side impact crash tests. An overview of the device and details on how it is used is provided. Typical data correlation between sled tests and crash tests is shown for FMVSS 214(dynamic) testing. EEVC side impact and lateral crash tests into a rigid pole have also been correlated with this device and will be made available upon request.</div>

Objective. The objective of the study was to determine which vehicle factors are significantly related to pelvic injury in side impact collisions. Identification of relevant parameters could aid in the reduction of these injuries. Method. Side impact crashes from the CIREN database were separated into those in which the occupant sustained a pelvic fracture and those in which no pelvic fracture occurred, although all occupants had serious injuries. A multibody MADYMO model was created of a USDOT SINCAP (U.S. Department of Transportation Side Impact New Car Assessment Program) test of a vehicle with a large center console. Results. From a study of 113 side impact crashes in the ciren database, nearside occupants with pelvic fractures (n = 78) had (i) more door intrusion (mean, 37 vs. 32 cm, p = 0.02) than those who had serious injuries, but not pelvic fractures (ii) a greater likelihood that the lower border of the door intruded more than the upper part (40% vs. 18%, p < 0.025); and (iii) a greater likelihood that their vehicle had a center console (47 vs. 17%, p < 0.005). Other parameters such as occupant age, weight, gender, vehicle weight, and struck vehicle speed change were not significantly different. MADYMO modeling showed that with a center console, an initial positive pelvic acceleration occurred at about 30 msec, followed at about 45 msec by a second acceleration peak in the opposite direction. Reducing console stiffness reduced the second acceleration but not the initial peak. Allowing the seat to translate laterally when contacted by the door reduced the initial pelvic acceleration by 50% and eliminated the second acceleration peak. Conclusions. Redesigning the center console using less stiff materials and allowing some lateral translation of the seat could aid in reducing pelvic injuries in side impact collisions.

In Euro NCAP standard, adult protection is one of the most important rating scores with 50% weight factor while child protection and pedestrian protection are accounted into consideration with 20% weight factor. For adult protection testing, three tests are required to perform: (1) side impact, (2) pole impact, (3) front impact. In the side impact test, dummy's head, chest, shoulder, thorax, ribs, abdomen, pelvic and femur must be studied to evaluate the rating score. Crashworthiness of a car during side impact can describe the score rated for that car. In this paper the goal is to determine the crashworthiness of side doors and B-pillar in side impact crash test by simulation using LS DYNA software in order to predict required changes to achieve 5 star rating. A model of car has been developed using Hypermesh and CATIA software. A mobile deformable barrier (MDB) model and its honey comp area have been prepared with respect to ECE R95 and Euro NCAP standard. Initial condition such as velocity has been assigned to MDB. Results show that improvement in design in order to increase absorbed energy can probably has positive effect on crash performance as good as using side air bag in order to achieve 5 star rating.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has recently developed and evaluated a new side impact barrier to represent the front profile of pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles for a new consumer information program. In the development of this program, two dummies were considered for assessing driver injury risk in side-struck vehicles: EuroSID-2 (50th percentile male dummy) and SID-IIs (5th percentile female dummy). The purpose of this study was to compare injury responses and kinematics for these two dummies in side impact crash tests. The findings suggest that SID-IIs will be more effective in driving relevant improvements in side impact crash protection.

Finite element analysis of occupant head injuries: Parametric effects of the side curtain airbag deployment interaction with a dummy head in a side impact crash