ReviewTrauma registries in developing countries: A review of the published experience☆
Section snippets
Background
The global burden of injury is huge and growing, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).1 Access to quality trauma care is critical to reducing mortality and disability from injury.1, 2 In high-income countries (HICs), the introduction of systems of trauma care has led to a reduction in mortality and disability.3, 4, 5
Whilst LMICs suffer the greatest burden of injury, access to quality trauma care is, overall, less than in HICs.1, 2 This paradox has been recognised by
Methods
A structured review of the literature was performed. Relevant abstracts were identified by searching the following databases on 3 May 2011: MEDLINE, Embase and CINAHL. There were no date or language restrictions placed on the search. Key words employed in the search were: “trauma registry”, “trauma registries”, “trauma database*”, “trauma databank*”, “injury registry”, “injury registries”, “injury database*”, and “injury databank*”. An additional subject heading search was performed in MEDLINE
Results
The literature search initially returned 385 articles. Application of the inclusion criteria defined above led to the identification of 84 eligible journal articles available in full text English language.11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84
Discussion
This review has brought together the collective published experience of trauma registries in developing countries. It has utilised a prospectively developed tool to describe and analyse the features of trauma registries in developing countries. The review has demonstrated that the majority of trauma registry publications from developing countries have originated from a relatively small number of such countries. Specifically, amongst developing countries as defined by the UN Human Development
Conclusion
From developing countries, there have been less than 100 trauma registry publications in the medical literature covering less than 50 registries across just 21 countries. Most of these registries do not use ISS-based inclusion criteria, collect data from across all variable groups, including pre-hospital information, ED vital signs and survival, and focus only upon questions of epidemiology. Few trauma registries use scores of disability. Several trauma registries collect data on less than 20
Conflict of interest statement
There are no known or perceived conflicts of interest. There were no sources of funding for this study.
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2020, African Journal of Emergency MedicineCitation Excerpt :RTIs alone account for >10,000 deaths annually in Uganda and is the country's tenth most common cause of death [10,11]. While there are country-specific estimates of injury burden, there is a lack of regionally available data, largely due to underdeveloped data systems to collect comprehensive injury statistics among health centers in most LMICs [12,13]. A crucial component of improving trauma care is the establishment of trauma registries, which capture the epidemiology of injury and the clinical care provided to the injured [14].
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Source of work: Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Monash University (Alfred Campus), Commercial Road, Melbourne, 3004, Australia.