Researchers in Canada have combined two technologies – driving simulation and functional magnetic resonance imaging of the brain – to identify the parts of the brain involved in a variety of real-world driving maneuvers. Minimal brain activation was found during simple driving tasks such as turning right (in the US, turning left in Australia), consistent with the ‘automation’ […]
Latest articles
Public Health Nurses Roles in Injury and Violence Prevention
Another contribution from Michael Watson, Nottingham. Research carried out by the National Nursing Research Unit (UK) has revealed that while health visitors deliver real benefits to patients and families, there is a need for more research and better education in order to develop the profession. This scoping study incorporated a narrative review of the research […]
Child Safety Strategies – A NICE evidence update
Michael Watson, from the Univ of Nottingham, kindly sent this information to the blog: In February an Evidence Update was produced by the English National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE). The document provides a summary of new evidence from around the world relevant to strategies to prevent unintentional injuries among children and young […]
Josh Freed: Stop sweating the big stuff
Editors note: The author of this piece, Josh Freed, writes a regular humorous column for the Montreal Gazette. He is one of my perennial favourites because important messages are often embedded in the humour. The following is a splendid example of a message about risk taking that i urge you to share with colleagues. We desperately need to […]
Job Opportunity: Faculty Position in Violence Epidemiology (USA; California)
The University of California, Davis, School of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine is seeking to fill a faculty position at the Associate or Full Professor in Residence Level. The focus of this position is on the design and execution of large-scale observational and experimental research into violence and its prevention. This faculty member will serve […]
Recent age and sex trends of suicides in veterans require in-depth investigations
On February 1st, the United States Department of Veterans Affairs released the most recent statistics on suicides in veterans. The report is based on data from 21 states from 1999 to 2010. The report presented suicide trends in veterans in two different ways. First it showed that in 1999 one in four persons committing suicide […]
Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) – Be informed
I watched a fascinating news program last night which featured the progressive brain degeneration of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). The brain degeneration is associated with memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, impulse control problems, aggression, depression, and, eventually, progressive dementia. See this website for more information: http://www.bu.edu/cste/about/what-is-cte/ The link between boxing and CTE was found almost a […]
At last: a serious response to reducing speeds
I have often asserted that the single most effective preventive measure for reducing motor vehicle injuries is reducing speed. A report in USA Today describes a movement in the UK to this end. It seems appropriate that it comes from the UK because that was where I first found convincing evidence of how effective it could […]
Clinton exaggerates effect of assault weapon expiry?
There was a posting by Glen Kessler in the Washington Post in mid January in a column called “Fact Checker” which argued that Bill Clinton’s assertion about the effect of the expiry of the assault weapons ban was greatly exaggerated. Clinton is quoted as stating, “Half of all mass killings in the United States have […]
Learning from the experience of gun control in Australia
Simon Chapman points out that his 2006 paper in Injury Prevention “Australia’s 1996 gun law reforms: faster falls in firearm deaths, firearm suicides, and a decade without mass shootings,” was downloaded over 80,000 time in December 2012, presumably following the tragedy in Sandy Hook. The article usage statistics for this paper (as for all the papers we publish) […]