Road traffic mortality in North Chennai – An autopsy based study

Abstract

An accident is an unplanned event that results in injury, deaths, damage to property or some other losses. For statistical purpose, Accidental Deaths have been classified as deaths that could be due to forces/factors of the nature which have been termed as ‘Natural Accidental Deaths’ or could be due to deliberate or negligent conduct of human beings, which is termed as ‘Un-natural Accidental Deaths’ or due to causes not covered in the above two categories and with no initial apparent cause of deaths which have been categorised as ‘Other Causes of Deaths’ like poisoning, sudden death etc. (1) India has a well-knit and coordinated system of transport which plays an important role in development of economic activities by promoting fair distribution of produced goods and services. The share of transport sector in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of India is steadily growing. It is one of the key indicators in assessment of socio-economic development of the country. Tamil Nadu has reported for 9.8% of total deaths in traffic accidents reported at all India level in the year 2015. (1) The present study was conducted to analyze the socio-demographic and clinical profile of deaths due to road accidents which were brought to the Department of Forensic Medicine for autopsy during the year 2019. Road traffic accidents is a well-known causative and contributer to a high number of mortality and morbidity. Urbanisation leading to widening of roads, increase in motor vehicles are among the few contributing factors to the increase in number of road accidents. Males in the productive age group being the most common victims is also a well documented fact. In this study, we observed a high number of fatalities in the National highways and the service roads connecting the nearby villages. Also we observed maximum fatalities in accidents that occurred in the mid – day and evening when they are mostly on their way back home from work. Apart from strict regulations, it is the in