Magnitude and Factors Associated with Road Traffic Accident among Traumatized Patients in Arba Minch General hospital, 2017

Introduction: RTAs are among the leading causes of death and injury worldwide, causing an estimated 1.2 million deaths and 50 million injuries each year (World Health Organization (WHO), 2004). Ethiopia has the highest rate of RTAs, owing to the fact that road transport is the major transportation system in the country. However; it is often possible to minimize injury and crash consequences by providing better information about specific factors associated with RTA. Like other hospitals of Ethiopia, AMH is faced with the problem of traumatized patients. Objective: To assess the magnitude and factors associated with road traffic accident related trauma among traumatized patients in Arba Minch Hospital, 2017. Method: Institutional based cross sectional study was carried out among trauma victims presenting to Arba Minch hospital from May 10 to June 10. Totally 238 trauma victims were interviewed. Data was entered and analyzed using SPSS version 20 software. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to see the association between dependent and independent variables. Results: A total of 238 trauma victims were included in the study. Of all interviewed trauma victims, 162(68.1%) were male and 76(31.9%) were female. The mean age of the victims was 25.5. The highest numbers of victims (33.6%) were aged between 20-29 years and followed by age 10-19 years (21.8%). The victim’ sex, age, occupation were significantly associated with RTA in a bivariate analysis. Conclusion and Recommendations: The magnitude of trauma caused by road traffic accident was the highest cause of trauma (47%). Road traffic accident victims were predominantly males and people aged 20-49 years. The majority of them are from urban areas. Of all road traffic accidents, motor vehicle crash was the primary causes of injury. Passengers and pedestrians were the most commonly affected victims. We recommend Arba Minch transport authority to give more attention for those motor cycle drivers as most of the trauma were due to motorcycle.