Frequency Distribution of Street Vehicle Accidents in Kermanshah (1998)

History & Objective: Accidents have their own nature and follow the same epidemiological pattern as many other diseases. That is, the agent, the host and the environment intract together to produce injury or damage. They occure more frequently in certain age-groups, at certain times of day, or week, and at certain localities. This study is an investingation on frequency distribution of street vehicle accidents in Kermanshah in 1377. This destriptive- crossectional investigation has made use of available information in Kermanshah Traffice Police Department as well as available files in Medical Jurisprudence Organization of this city.

Materials & Method: The variables of this descriptive study include: age, sex, kind of accident, drivers’ level of education, time, place, and the cause of the accident, weather conditions, human factors, mechanical defects which led to accidents, number of the injured and the dead along with. the age of the injured. The tolal number of accidents was 2334, which were divided into four main categories. 82% of the accidents were known to be compromise accidents. Then came accidents which led to injuries (10.9%). The third category of accidents were those which led to vehicle’s destruction (8.7%) and the last one are those led to death (0.2%). 99.7% of drivers were male. Most of the drivers (86.2%) were between 20 and 40 years of age (86.2%).

Results: The highest rate of accidents was between 11 and 12AM and then are those

between 4 and 6PM. Most accidents occurred on Sturdays and Thursday with the

 precentage rate of 17.31% and 16.37% respectively. Spring had the highest
number of accidents (30.6%) in comparison with other seasons. Among 100 encoded places in the city most of the accidents occurred on Shahid Beheshti Bolvard(11.4%), then come Kordad 5 Square (5.3%) and.

Discussion: Main reasons of accidents were disregarding the right of priority (31.4%), disregarding the appropriate distanc (25.4%) , and sudden change of line (12%). Most  of accidents happened in clear and dry weather condition(94.39%). Among 114 victims who were killed in car accidents in Kermanshah 99% were male,  (86.84%). The number of people who were killed in car accidents was the highest in autum(39.47%).