By Charles Pekow — Are ebikes more or less safe than conventional ones? Ebike riders tend to be older, but even when accounting for age, they are likely to suffer more serious and multiple injuries and be hospitalized. There’s a need to focus on chest injuries, concludes a study done in Switzerland.
The project looked at 56 conventional bike riders and 27 ebikers who wound up at a trauma center. Only one-third of the accidents involved autos. Ebikers averaged 60 years old; others 45. Most injuries involved limbs or skin.
But given that older ebikers were more likely to suffer chest/thorax injuries, the researchers advise emergency room medics to look for symptoms there when ebikers arrive after a crash.
The project noted, however, that the patients in the study may not accurately reflect the universe of bike riders – as those with injuries such as brain trauma may have been taken to a different medical facility. The project also couldn’t tell if slower reaction time in older riders played a role in their accidents. Nor could it tell whether increased speed or weight of ebikes contributed to crashes.
Find Increased Injury Severity and Hospitalization Rates Following Crashes with E-bikes Versus Conventional Bicycles: An Observational Cohort Study from a Regional Level II Trauma Center in Switzerland at https://pssjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13037-022-00318-9
