Despite lower indices of injury severity, even after taking account of comorbidities, mortality was significantly increased in elderly patients admitted to a trauma center with rib fractures.

No abstract

The NISS is a more accurate predictor of in-hospital death than the ISS and should be chosen over the ISS for case-mix control in trauma research, especially in certain subpopulations such as head/neck-injured patients.

Prognostic study, level III.

No abstract

LVF is a frequent cause of admission for trauma in the elderly. Despite the apparent benign nature of the mechanism, LVF is associated with more severe injuries and worse outcome.

Among patients 55 years of age or older who present with closed head injury, the use of warfarin before trauma appears to be associated with a higher frequency of isolated head trauma, more severe head trauma, and a higher likelihood of death. The findings of this retrospective study support the concern about the adverse effects of anticoagulants in cases of head trauma.

The GCS in its present form is an efficient predictor of in-hospital mortality, which could benefit from statistical transformation in logistic regression models when the accuracy of estimated probabilities of mortality is important. The common use of GCS categories for modeling mortality leads to loss of information and should be discarded.