Tuesday, 21 March 2017

Retrospective Analysis of Drowning Incidents at a University Hospital in Switzerland

Analysis of Drowning Incidents


The annual rate of accidental fatal drowning in Switzerland is about 50 deaths/year (0.6/100 000). We report on the fatal and non-fatal drowning incidents among adults that were treated at the University Hospital in Bern, Switzerland, between 2000 and 2014.

Retrospective analysis of the electronic database of the emergency centre for adults of the university hospital in Bern. Between 2000 and 2014 all fatal and non-fatal drowning incidents were analysed using specific medical keywords.

126 patients were included. Ninety-one (72%) were male, 94 (76%) aged between 16-44 years, 107 (89%) of the incidents occurred in rivers. In 83 (68%) cases the activity during the incident was swimming. Twentytwo (18%) were non-accidental drowning incidents, 14 (11%) of all the drowning patients needed reanimation and 6 (4.8%) died within 24 h.


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