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Observational Study
. 2025 Jan;139(1):375-381.
doi: 10.1007/s00414-024-03339-4. Epub 2024 Oct 4.

Fatal road traffic accidents and injuries: a preliminary study

Alessandro Sartori  1 , Alessia Russo  2 , Andrea Sardo  2 , Dario Raniero  2
Affiliations
Observational Study

Fatal road traffic accidents and injuries: a preliminary study

Alessandro Sartori et al. Int J Legal Med. 2025 Jan.

Abstract

Road traffic accidents (RTAs) are a major public health problem globally and cause deaths, disability, and significant economic costs. In Italy, there was an increased number of road accidents, deaths, and injuries in 2022 compared to 2021, although still below pre-pandemic levels. A retrospective observational study was performed on a case series of 53 consecutive fatal RTAs examined by the Section of Forensic Medicine of Verona. The case series was divided, according to the type of victims involved, into pedestrians, car drivers, car passengers, and motorcyclists. For each, the times and causes of death, the distribution of external and internal injuries, and toxicological data were analysed, and the results were compared with those in the literature. Although this is a preliminary study on a small case series and lacks statistical validation, so more cases are needed, the preliminary results seem to provide a useful tool for assessing injuries in complex fatal road accidents.

Keywords: Autopsy; Forensic; Injury pattern; Road accidents; Traffic-related deaths.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Human ethics and consent to participate: Not applicable. Informed consent: Our report does not involve the application of experimental protocols; therefore, it does not require approval by an institutional and/or licensing committee nor informed consent. Consent for publication: Data are covered by the general authorization to process personal data for scientific research purposes granted by the Italian Data Protection Authority (published in Italy’s Official Journal no. 72 dated 26 March 2012), for scientific research purposes, since the data do not entail any significant personalized impact on data subjects. In all cases, local prosecutors opened an investigation, ordering that an autopsy be performed to clarify the exact cause of death. All the authors consent to publish details and tables included in the manuscript. Competing interests: The authors have no competing interests and no relevant financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

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