Using participant event monitoring in a cohort study of unintentional injuries among children and adolescents

Abstract

Objectives: We conducted a 3-year cohort study of 407 youths aged 9 to 18 years to develop multivariable risk prediction models of agriculture-related injuries.

Methods: Data were obtained via participant event monitoring, with youths self-reporting injuries and exposures in daily diaries over a 13-week period. We evaluated data quality by comparing injury self-reports with other injury data.

Results: Semilogarithmic plots of rates of all unintentional injuries combined (US data from 2000) as well as of agriculture-related injuries (US and Canadian data from 19 previous studies) graphed as a function of injury severity exhibited linearity, as did plots based on the present results. Severity-specific unintentional injury rates were 1.4- to 4.3-times higher than national rates, suggesting that our methodology can significantly reduce injury underreporting. In addition, at each severity level, estimated agriculture-related injury rates were 5.8- to 9.3-times higher than rates from previous national, regional, and state-based studies.

Conclusions: Our approach to participant event monitoring can be implemented with youths aged 9 to 18 years and will yield reliable daily data on unintentional injuries.

FIGURE 1—

Log-transformed injury incidence rates from the present study, the US population of 9- to 18-year-olds as a whole, and 19 national and regional studies: all unintentional injuries combined (a) and agriculture-related injuries (b). Note. Severity/treatment dispositions were classified as no treatment (1); minor treatment or first aid (2); treatment at a hospital, clinic, or doctor’s office followed by release (3); and treatment at a hospital, clinic, or doctor’s office followed by hospitalization (4).