Citation

Chang DC, Williams M, Sangji NF, Britt LD, Rogers SO. J. Trauma Acute Care Surg. 2016; 80(6): 870-876.

Affiliation

1 Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. 2 Department of Surgery, Medical Element, Soto Cano Air Base, Comayagua, Honduras. 3 Department of Surgery, Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, Virginia, USA. 4 Department of Surgery, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, Galveston, Texas, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2016, Lippincott Williams and Wilkins)

DOI

10.1097/TA.0000000000001000

PMID

26886001

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The pattern of law-enforcement related injuries of police and civilians in the US is unknown.

METHODS: Data were aggregated from the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), the Bureau of Justice (BOJ) Statistics, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS), and the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) from 2003-2011. Law-enforcement related injuries in the CDC WISQARS and the NIS were identified using E codes 970-976, which are meant to identify "injuries inflicted by the police or other law-enforcing agents, including military on duty, in the course of arresting or attempting to arrest lawbreakers, suppressing disturbances, maintaining order, and other legal action".

RESULTS: The CDC reported a total of 715,118 non-fatal injuries and 3,156 fatal injuries from 2003 to 2011. In contrast, for the same time period, the NIS identified a total of 3,958 patients, ranging from 348 to 572 per year. Among the injured, 1,548 (48.0%) were whites, 866 were blacks (26.8%), and 605 were Hispanics (18.8%); and 1,011 patients (25.5%) were injured by firearms, while 2,304 (58.2%) suffered from blows or manhandling. Firearm-injured hospitalized patients are more likely to be males, blacks or Hispanics, and in the 18-39 age group.

CONCLUSIONS: The majority of law-enforcement related injuries are among white or black young men. Hispanic patients are more likely to be injured by a firearm than struck. When categorized by firearm, white and black patients are more likely to die than Hispanic patients. Unfortunately, data about these injuries are scattered across multiple data systems. A uniform national system to aggregate these data sources is needed to better understand the scope of the problem, for both law enforcement personnel and civilians.

Language: en