Five years after the accident, whiplash casualties still have poorer quality of life in the physical domain than other mildly injured casualties: analysis of the ESPARR cohort

Abstract

Defined as an acceleration-deceleration mechanism in the neck, whiplash is the most common injury in road accidents, particularly for motorists: over the 2007-2010 period (French road safety database), 35 % of injured car occupants were concerned [1]. The annual incidence rate of casualties suffering from whiplash seems to be of the same order of magnitude in most countries (annual incidence between 0.04 and 3.2/1,000 inhabitants [2, 3]). A study of drivers in collisions involving two cars found similar results in French (1997-2003) and Spanish databases (2002-2004) [4]: 12.2 % were diagnosed with whiplash in France and 12.0 % in Spain.