Background Students' injury surveillance is important in injury prevention and control. Therefore, we developed the primary and secondary school students injury surveillance system (PSSSISS) and evaluated it in primary and secondary schools of Shenzhen.

Aims Aims of this study were to assess PSSSISS in Shenzhen, find out the problems existed in this system, provide feedback to guide injury prevention and intervention, and thus to reduce the injury rate among students.

Methods A total of 22 schools (11 primary schools, seven junior high schools and four senior high schools) were included into the surveillance during the period 2006–2010. Quality and quantity methods were used to assess PMSSISS. Additionally, Updated Guidelines for Evaluating Public Health Surveillance Systems was also used as a reference.

Results Results from PSSSISS showed that injury cumulative incidence in each academic year was between 0.80% and 1.16% from 2006 to 2010 among Shenzhen students. Injury rate of boys was higher than the rate of girls, and 37.52% of injuries occurred in sports. Furthermore, the leading cause of injuries was falls/trips (61.53%) and bone fracture was the leading result caused by injuries (30.91%). Using quality and quantity methods we found that PSSSISS was good in the following aspects: simplicity, flexibility, data quality, acceptability, stability and representativeness. However, sensitivity and timeliness of PSSSISS needed to be improved.

Significance Although PSSSISS has some flaws needed to be improved, it is a feasible and effective injury surveillance system for primary and secondary school students' injury surveillance.