Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Dec;18(1):2266238.
doi: 10.1080/19932820.2023.2266238. Epub 2023 Oct 8.

Burden and predictions of hospitalized injuries in a low-middle income country: results from a Tunisian university hospital

Meriem Kacem  1 , Cyrine Bennasrallah  1 , Hela Abroug  1 , Manel Ben Fredj  1 , Imen Zemni  1 , Wafa Dhouib  1 , Amel Gara  1 , Ameni Maatouk  1 , Issam Aloui  2 , Samir Nouira  3 , Ines Bouanene  1 , Asma Sriha Belguith  1
Affiliations

Burden and predictions of hospitalized injuries in a low-middle income country: results from a Tunisian university hospital

Meriem Kacem et al. Libyan J Med. 2023 Dec.

Abstract

Injuries are responsible for a high premature mortality and disability. They are poorly explored in low and middle income-countries. We aimed to estimate the burden of hospitalized injuries in the Monastir governorate (Tunisia) according to the nature of the injury, trends and projections of hospitalizations for injuries up until 2024, and to identify the distribution of this disease burden based on age and sex. We performed a descriptive study from 2002 to 2012 including all hospitalizations for injuries. Data were collected from morbidity and mortality register of the University Hospital of Monastir (Tunisia). We estimated the burden of injuries using the Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs). We described injuries (crude prevalence rate (CPR) and age standardized prevalence rate (ASR)), related mortality (lethality and standardized mortality ratio (SMR)), trends and prediction for 2024. A total of 18,632 hospitalizations for injuries representing 10% of all hospitalizations during study period were recorded. Per 1000 inhabitants per year, CPR was 3.36 and the ASR was 3.44. The lethality was of 17.5 deaths per 1000 injured inpatients per year and the SMR was of 2.95 (Confidence Interval of 95%: 2.64-3.29). Burden related to injuries was 2.36 DALYs per 1000 population per year, caused mainly by Years of Life Lost (83.4%), most frequent among men aged under 40 years. The predicted ASR for 2024 was 4.46 (3.81-5.23) per 1000 person-years. Injuries to the head was the most prevalent (20.7%) causing 67.7% of DALYs; and increasing by 226% through 2024. Injuries had a high prevalence and an important burden in a Tunisian university hospital. Prediction showed increased prevalence for 2024. Preventive measures and a trauma surveillance register should be implemented soon.

Keywords: Epidemiology; global burden of disease; mortality; prevalence; trends; wounds and injuries.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Distribution of age at the time of admission for injuries (Monastir, Tunisia 2002–2012). Legend: this figure shows grouped age Boxplots according to the injury’s subgroups. Each boxplot represents the median age with the interquartile range (the first quartile in light gray and the third quartile in dark gray), and the extreme age values.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Main injury groups responsible for total burden caused by injuries in Monastir-Tunisia (2002–2012). Legend: A: DALYs, B: YLLs; C: YLDs. data represent the percentage of the main injury groups responsible for the total DALYs (DALYs: disability-adjusted life years), the total YLLs (years of life lost to premature mortality) and the total YLDs (years lived with disability.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Trends and predictions for 2024 of hospitalizations for injuries (Monastir, Tunisia). Legend: this figure shows trends of the number of injuries between 2002 –2012 and the projections until 2024 using Poisson log linear regression.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. World Health Organisation . Injury-related disability and rehabilitation. WHO: [cited 2019 May 21] Available from: https://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/disability/en/.
    1. Krug EG, Sharma GK, Lozano R.. The global burden of injuries. Am J Public Health. 2000;90(4):523‑ 6. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Jaffry Z, Chokotho LC, Harrison WJ, et al. The burden of trauma at a district hospital in Malawi. Trop Doct. 2017;47(4):286‑ 91. doi: 10.1177/0049475517690333 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Bakar C, Cevizci S, Gündoğar D, et al. Prevalence of unintentional injuries and related risk factors among university students in Canakkale city, Western Turkey. Cent Eur J Public Health. 2014;22(3):189‑ 96. doi: 10.21101/cejph.a3974 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) . Findings from the global burden of disease study 2017. Seattle, WA: IHME; 2018. [cited 2019 Jun 7]. Available from: http://www.healthdata.org/sites/default/files/files/policy_report/2019/G...