Falls are the leading cause of all accidental deaths in elderly white women, and fractures usually of the lower limb account for most of the deaths. These appear to be chiefly associated with "bone fragility," a condition most prevalent in elderly white women. Both osteoporosis and deaths from falls seem to be lower where the drinking water has a high fluoride content.
THE ETIOLOGY OF FRACTURED HIPS IN FEMALESFALLS are the leading cause of nontransport accidental death in all persons and the leading cause of all acci. dental death in elderly white females in the United States. About threequarters of all deaths from falls occur to persons aged 65 and over. Almost 90 per cent of the deaths from falls in the white female are to persons 65 and over but only about two-thirds of the fall deaths to white males involve those 65 and over. In contrast to death, injury from falls is most frequent in youth.The death rate for falls is moderately high in the preschool child, extremely low in children of school age, and extremely high in the older age groups with rates increasing with age. For persons under 45 years of age, the highest rates are in infants under one year of age. Figure 1 shows the fall death rates for ages 45 and over for [1959][1960][1961] and it may be noted that up to about age 65 male rates are higher than female and nonwhite higher than white. In the older age groups white females have the highest rates followed by white males, with nonwhite males having the lowest rates. Injuries from falls show somewhat the same sex pattern, with the male rate higher than the female throughout the school years, and the female rate becoming relatively higher with advancing age.
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