Injury pattern in lethal motorbikes-pedestrian collisions, in the area of Barcelona, Spain.
INTRODUCTION
There are several studies about M1 type vehicle-pedestrian collision injury pattern, and based on them, there has been several changes in automobiles for pedestrian protection. However, the lack of sufficient studies about injury pattern in motorbikes-pedestrian collisions leads to a lack of optimization design of these vehicles. The objective of this research is to study the injury pattern of pedestrians involved in collisions with motorized two-wheeled vehicles.


METHODS
A retrospective descriptive study of pedestrian's deaths after collisions with motorcycles in an urban area, like Barcelona was performed. The cases were collected from the Forensic Pathology Service database of the Institute of Legal Medicine of Catalonia. The selected cases were categorized as pedestrian-motorcycle collision, between January 1st, 2005 and December 31st, 2014. Data were collected from the autopsy, medical, and police report. The collected information was then analyzed using Microsoft Excel statistical functions.


RESULTS
Traumatic Brain Injury is the main cause of death in pedestrian hit by motorized two-wheeled vehicles (62.85%). The most frequent injury was the subarachnoid hemorrhage, in 71.4% of cases, followed by cerebral contusions and skull base fractures (65.7%). By contrast, pelvic fractures and tibia fractures only appeared in 28.6%.


CONCLUSIONS
The study characterizes the injury pattern of pedestrians involved in a collision with motorized two-wheeled vehicles in an urban area, like Barcelona, which has been found to be different from other vehicle-pedestrian collisions, with a higher incidence of brain injuries and minor frequency of lower extremities fractures in pelvis, tibia and fibula.
['Rebollo-Soria|M Carmen|MC|', 'Arregui-Dalmases|Carlos|C|', 'Sánchez-Molina|David|D|', 'Velázquez-Ameijide|Juan|J|', 'Galtés|Ignasi|I|']
D000063:Accidents, Traffic D000293:Adolescent D000328:Adult D000368:Aged D000369:Aged, 80 and over D000070642:Brain Injuries, Traumatic D002423:Cause of Death D005260:Female D005554:Forensic Medicine D006470:Hemorrhage D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D009049:Motorcycles D000069636:Pedestrians D012189:Retrospective Studies D012887:Skull Fractures D013030:Spain D015599:Trauma Severity Indices D014947:Wounds and Injuries D055815:Young Adult
Injury pattern Motorcycles Autopsy Traumatic brain injury Motorbikes Pedestrian collision