Car Surfing: a Dangerous Phenomenon
Risky Behavior Results in Catastrophic Injuries
Medical professionals are trying to get an accurate picture of the number and types of injuries sustained by individuals treated in emergency rooms from car surfing. One of the limitations of accurately studying this behavior is that there is currently not a code for “car surfing” in the traditional public health database for reporting injuries.
Incidence of Catastrophic Injury in United States
Because of this limitation, Dr. Greenspan (Centers of Disease Control) investigated the incidence of injuries from car surfing utilizing United States newspaper reports. Dr. Greenspan reviewed newspapers utilizing a LexisNexis search for “car surfing” and “injury” and “death” from 1990 through August, 2008.
The research revealed that most of the injuries were sustained by males (70%) with the majority of those injured between the ages of 15 and 19 (69%). Fifty-eight deaths were reported along with 41 non-fatal injuries. Head trauma was cited as the cause of death in 45 of the 58 cases (Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, October 17, 2008).
Trauma Center Based Research
A fifteen year study reported in the Journal of Trauma reviewed patient information from the trauma center at Miami Valley Hospital Trauma Service. The authors reported that 35 patients were treated from injuries sustained during car surfing with the average age of the patient at 19.5 years of age (Carey, J., McCarthy, M.C., Ekeh, A.P., Patterson, L., & Woods, R., 2005).
This study revealed an increase in the number of injuries treated during each five year period (9 during the first five years; 10 during the second five years; 16 during the last five years). Head trauma was the leading injury (82.9%) with a total of five fatalities. Another interesting fact was that alcohol was involved in 77.8% of the individuals age 21 or above.
Data from the Methodist Health and Hospital System in Dallas, Texas was collected over a four year period from their trauma center. Eight car surfing patients were identified. Five of the eight had significant intracranial injuries (two epidural hematomas; two subdural hematomas; and one subarachnoid hematoma). There were no deaths reported, although four of the eight patients needed surgical intervention.
Types of Injuries Sustained
The earliest research on injuries sustained during car surfing was collected between 1991-1999 by Geiger, J.D., Newsted, J., Drongowski, R.A., & Lelli, J.L. (Journal of Pediatric Surgery, 2001). Their research revealed 26 patients treated (18 males, 8 females) with the average age of 15.7.
A majority of injuries were to the head and neck with the following breakdown:
- Closed head injuries – 85%
- Skull fractures – 49%
- Intracranial bleeding – 35%
- Spinal column fracture – 12%
- Permanent paralysis – 8%
- Extremity fractures – 8%
- Pelvic fractures – 11.7%
Noted in each research article was the concern over the prevalence of car surfing images on internet videos as a possible reason for the increase in the incidence of this high risk activity.
Instead of glorifying this activity, these videos need to be removed from public sites. The general public also needs to be educated as to what this activity is along with information on the high incidence of catastrophic injury.
Public health databases need to incorporate a code for “car surfing” so that accurate data can be collected and analyzed. Accurate data along with education will hopefully decrease the number of participants in this sport thereby reducing the number of catastrophic injuries.
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