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Abstract
Iran has one of the greatest death rates from road traffic injuries (RTIs). There is no national injury surveillance in Iran and there is uncertainty on measures of RTIs.
We studied the annual incidence of RTIs, the incidence of RTIs per 1000 vehicles and utilisation of vehicles in Tehran.
Methods In this population-based study, 2488 households were randomly selected for interview using the registry of residential addresses. They were asked to report any RTIs in their household during the past year.
Results 9100 inhabitants were included. There were 119 RTI (38.7% pedestrians, 46.2% motorcycler and 15.1% car occupants) and three deaths in the survey sample. The annual incidence of all RTIs for 100 000 population was 1310 (1080–1560) and that of fatal traffic injuries was 32.97 (6.8–96.3).
Motorcycles were involved in 41.3% of RTIs that occurred for pedestrians. 19.7% of the households had motorcycle; 2.4% belonged to women. Women were mostly rode as passengers rather than driving a motorcycle. The annual incidence of collision RTI for 1000 motorcycle was 95. Moreover, 32.5% of the motorcycle riders had experienced non-collision transport accident (ie, fall).
58.5% of the households owned a car; 12.3% belonged to women.
The annual incidence of car occupant RTI per 1000 car was 10.
Conclusion Although the number of motorcycles is one third of cars, they are involved in a considerable proportion of RTIs; there is need for effective safety regulations to control this pattern.