Injury Pattern as an Indication of Seat Belt Failure in Ejected Vehicle Occupants

Abstract

Prior authors have suggested that when occupant ejection occurs in association with a seat belt failure, entanglement of the outboard upper extremity (OUE) with the retracting shoulder belt will invariably occur, leaving injury pattern evidence of belt use. In the present investigation, the authors assessed this theory using data accessed from the NASS-CDS for ejected front seat occupants of passenger vehicles. Logistic regression models were used to assess the associations between seat belt failure status and injuries. Injury types associated with seat belt failure were significant OUE and head injuries (OR = 3.87, [95% CI 1.2, 13.0] and 3.1, [95% CI 1.0, 9.7], respectively). The two injury types were found to be a predictor of seat belt use and subsequent failure only if combined with a high (≥0.8) precrash probability of belt use. The injury pattern associated with a seat belt failure-related ejection has limited use in the forensic investigation of crash-related ejections.

Behavior and Non-Behavior Predictors of Seat Belt Use amongst Iranian Bus Passengers

“…In this study, the role of the environment in the use of seatbelts by passengers was associated with some factors, such as available belts, easy access to them, as well as the safety of the belt, since many passengers have attributed seatbelt use to these factors. In other studies, the importance of access to non-defective seatbelts in the vehicles has been also mentioned [19][20][21].…”