Skip to main content

Lawn Mowers Can Be an Accident Waiting to Happen

SATURDAY, Sept. 29, 2018 (HealthDay News) -- Mowing your lawn can be a dangerous job, resulting in severe injury or even the loss of a limb.

A new review of 51,000 lawn mower injuries between 2006 and 2013 found that 85 percent of the injuries were to men. Moreover, children up to age 4 were six times more likely to have a foot or toe or lower extremity injury and nearly two times more likely to have an amputation than those aged 15 and older.

Older teens and adults were more than eight times more likely to have an injury to a hand or arm.

"Despite consumer education programs and warning labels, lawn mower injuries in the United States remain a serious public health concern," said senior study author Dr. Deborah Schwengel, an assistant professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.

Young children are more likely to get injured by running into the yard while a family member is using a mower or getting their foot trapped in the mower while sitting in the lap of someone running the mower, the researchers noted.

Most teens and adults are hurt when they stick their hands in the mower to clear debris, Schwengel's team found.

The researchers weren't able to tell which types of mowers were the most dangerous.

For the study, researchers used data from the U.S. Nationwide Emergency Department Sample, the largest emergency department database in the country.

Most of the injuries were cuts (47 percent), fractures (22 percent) and amputations (22 percent). Most were to the wrist or hand (65 percent) and foot or toe (20 percent).

Thirty-eight percent of the injuries occurred in the South. Most injuries (66 percent) occurred on weekdays. Most (82 percent) happened between April and September.

Costs to treat these injuries in emergency rooms averaged $2,500, and nearly $37,000 when patients were admitted to the hospital, the researchers estimated.

"Understanding what types of injuries occur in certain groups should help engineers design safer lawn mowers and policymakers create more appropriate prevention policies," Schwengel said in a Hopkins news release.

A better lawn mower design that could prevent injury, for example, would be one that automatically stops the mower when human flesh is detected near the blades, the researchers said.

The report was published in the September issue of Public Health Reports.

More information

The American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons has more on lawn mower safety.



from Healthday - Health.com https://ift.tt/2zFqakR
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

30 Math Puzzles (with Answers) to Test Your Smarts

Math is not everyone’s favorite, understandably. Hours of math homework and difficult equations can make anyone sour on the subject. But when math problems are outside of a school setting, there’s no time limit to do them, and they’ve got a fun, more whimsical concept than just finding x, they can be great activities for kids. (And adults, of course!) They test your brain and critical thinking skills, provide some constructive, educational fun,  and  provide tangible examples of math lessons you’ll actually use in real life . Math puzzles come in plenty of different varieties, too. Some more straightforward number puzzles do require calculations to find the solution. Others are more like logic puzzles and challenge you to look for a pattern. Still others present the puzzle through pictures, making them great for visual learners. From  Reader’s Digest ‘s “Mind Stretchers” books, these math puzzles have a bit of everything! If you’re more of a riddles person, we’ve got reg...
Post a Comment
Read more

41 of the Most Useful Mac Keyboard Shortcuts

Everyone wants everything they do on their computer to be fast. Their Internet connection, the speed they type, and how quickly they can save, open, and alter documents. These mac keyboard shortcuts can help you do just that. Try out these Mac hotkeys to make your browsing, typing, and viewing experiences a little more convenient. Here are some keyboard shortcuts that will make web browsing so much easier . Mac keyboard shortcuts allow you to do things on your computer that would typically require you to use a mouse, trackpad, or another device with a combination of the keys on your keyboard. To find the Mac shortcuts that are already set up on your device, go to System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts. From there you can look through the different mac keyboard shortcuts that are set up for your keyboard, launchpad and dock, Mission Control, Spotlight, and so on. To change an existing shortcut you can select the one you want to change, click on the key combination, and then ty...
Post a Comment
Read more

Will Cicadas Destroy Your Garden? 10 Things You Need to Know

It’s easy to wince thinking about the mass emergence of insects like cicadas. Their numbers can reach millions per acre, creating a near-deafening buzzing chorus. So it’s understandable that questions like, “Will cicadas eat my plants?” immediately spring to mind. But cicadas are also pretty fascinating and play important roles in the ecosystem. “Cicadas inspire wonder in our world!” says Jennifer Hopwood, senior pollinator conservation specialist at the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation. “They spend most of their life underground next to the same plant roots. Somehow, these creatures are able to track the years that pass by and time their emergence with other periodical cicadas in the region to overwhelm predators. They are amazing little critters.” Here’s a rundown of what to know about cicadas, good and bad, including whether or not they eat plants and how to protect your trees during an emergence. Get Readers Digest s Read Up newsletter for more gardening, humor, cl...
Post a Comment
Read more