Keeping our heads above water: A systematic review of fatal drowning in South Africa

Saunders, Colleen; Sewduth, D; Naidoo, Navindhra

doi:10.7196/samj.2017.v108i1.11090

Cited by 9 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 17 publications

(72 reference statements)

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“…In many African countries, cases go unreported and the lack of an injury surveillance system as seen in many LMIC also contributes to the limited data [65]. This is consistent with the findings of two recent systematic reviews describing the burden of drowning in South Africa and Tanzania [16,17]. Saunders et al and Sarrassat et al, reported that strengthening the existing surveillance systems or establishing new ones are needed for consistent and detailed drowning surveillance [16,17].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

“…Currently, there is no systematic review investigating drowning in Africa. Only three recent reviews on drowning in low- and middle-income countries, drowning in South Africa and Tanzania respectively have been published [8,16,17]. Therefore, it is imperative to understand the epidemiology, risk factors and current prevention strategies in Africa to direct policies for the prevention of drowning in Africa.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Epidemiology, Risk Factors and Measures for Preventing Drowning in Africa: A Systematic Review

Miller,

Alele,

Emeto

et al. 2019

Medicina

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Background and Objectives: Drowning is a leading cause of unintentional injury related mortality worldwide, and accounts for roughly 320,000 deaths yearly. Over 90% of these deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries with inadequate prevention measures. The highest rates of drowning are observed in Africa. The aim of this review is to describe the epidemiology of drowning and identify the risk factors and strategies for prevention of drowning in Africa. Materials and Methods: A review of multiple databases (MEDLINE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Scopus and Emcare) was conducted from inception of the databases to the 1st of April 2019 to identify studies investigating drowning in Africa. The preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analysis (PRISMA) was utilised. Results: Forty-two articles from 15 countries were included. Twelve articles explored drowning, while in 30 articles, drowning was reported as part of a wider study. The data sources were coronial, central registry, hospital record, sea rescue and self-generated data. Measures used to describe drowning were proportions and rates. There was a huge variation in the proportion and incidence rate of drowning reported by the studies included in the review. The potential risk factors for drowning included young age, male gender, ethnicity, alcohol, access to bodies of water, age and carrying capacity of the boat, weather and summer season. No study evaluated prevention strategies, however, strategies proposed were education, increased supervision and community awareness. Conclusions: There is a need to address the high rate of drowning in Africa. Good epidemiological studies across all African countries are needed to describe the patterns of drowning and understand risk factors. Further research is needed to investigate the risk factors and to evaluate prevention strategies.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Epidemiology, Risk Factors and Measures for Preventing Drowning in Africa: A Systematic Review

Miller,

Alele,

Emeto

et al. 2019

Medicina

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“…The limited peer-reviewed studies from Africa also highlight the need for a greater focus on drowning in Africa, especially considering that 11 of the 16 articles were from South Africa 5. Another review of drowning in South Africa showed large heterogeneity in drowning across the country, a potential challenge for estimating the number of drowning deaths in Africa 13…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 5 Another review of drowning in South Africa showed large heterogeneity in drowning across the country, a potential challenge for estimating the number of drowning deaths in Africa. 13 …”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For LMICs, this is likely related to changes in development and urbanisation,12 with the greatest reductions occurring in East Asia and southern sub-Saharan Africa 9. A recent review of drowning in South Africa found an increase in drowning across the country with variation based on geography,13 demonstrating that the drowning burden is not evenly distributed and that choosing data from a region within a country or a country within a region can potentially skew the findings.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The burden of unintentional drowning: global, regional and national estimates of mortality from the Global Burden of Disease 2017 Study

Franklin¹,

Peden²,

Hamilton³

et al. 2020

Inj Prev

162

164

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BackgroundDrowning is a leading cause of injury-related mortality globally. Unintentional drowning (International Classification of Diseases (ICD) 10 codes W65-74 and ICD9 E910) is one of the 30 mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive causes of injury-related mortality in the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study. This study’s objective is to describe unintentional drowning using GBD estimates from 1990 to 2017.MethodsUnintentional drowning from GBD 2017 was estimated for cause-specific mortality and years of life lost (YLLs), age, sex, country, region, Socio-demographic Index (SDI) quintile, and trends from 1990 to 2017. GBD 2017 used standard GBD methods for estimating mortality from drowning.ResultsGlobally, unintentional drowning mortality decreased by 44.5% between 1990 and 2017, from 531 956 (uncertainty interval (UI): 484 107 to 572 854) to 295 210 (284 493 to 306 187) deaths. Global age-standardised mortality rates decreased 57.4%, from 9.3 (8.5 to 10.0) in 1990 to 4.0 (3.8 to 4.1) per 100 000 per annum in 2017. Unintentional drowning-associated mortality was generally higher in children, males and in low-SDI to middle-SDI countries. China, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh accounted for 51.2% of all drowning deaths in 2017. Oceania was the region with the highest rate of age-standardised YLLs in 2017, with 45 434 (40 850 to 50 539) YLLs per 100 000 across both sexes.ConclusionsThere has been a decline in global drowning rates. This study shows that the decline was not consistent across countries. The results reinforce the need for continued and improved policy, prevention and research efforts, with a focus on low- and middle-income countries.

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Child pedestrian, drowning and burn mortality in Johannesburg

Bulbulia

Niekerk

Swart

et al. 2022

International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion

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Keeping our heads above water: A systematic review of fatal drowning in South Africa

Cited by 9 publications

References 17 publications

Epidemiology, Risk Factors and Measures for Preventing Drowning in Africa: A Systematic Review

Epidemiology, Risk Factors and Measures for Preventing Drowning in Africa: A Systematic Review

The burden of unintentional drowning: global, regional and national estimates of mortality from the Global Burden of Disease 2017 Study

Child pedestrian, drowning and burn mortality in Johannesburg

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