Age and gender effects on injury outcome for restrained occupants in frontal crashes: a comparison of UK and US data bases.

Field accident data from NASS/CDS in the US and CCIS in the UK are compared. The UK sample is deliberately weighted to conform to the same AIS proportions (within AIS 2-6) as the weighted NASS data so that crash severity distributions can be compared for various selected outcomes. Age and gender have a significant effect on the delta V distributions and median delta V values. These differences are documented both for overall AIS 2-6, 3-6, and 4-6, and also for body regions of the head, neck, chest, abdomen and upper and lower extremities. Anomalies between the two samples are profound which raises doubts about the recording of belt use in NASS and the calculation of delta V at lower crash severities.