Health, Accidents | Major under-reporting of accidents: Bergen residents must now register their injuries.

– We live by Skansen. There are fences that are hanging and flailing, plus loose and rather missing in several places which can easily lead to accidents, says Truls Olsen.

He is at the Accident and Injury Clinic at Bergen Health Center with partner Malin Winter, who has fallen on a trip and injured her arm. She can’t blame anything other than her own inattention, she admits.

Both she and her partner are constantly reporting errors and deficiencies to the municipality, without improvements being made, they say.

– It seems that nothing happens until someone gets seriously injured or dies, says Winter.

– More accidents than you think

– There is a large and systematic under-reporting of bicycle and scooter accidents, says senior researcher at the Institute of Transport Economics (TØI) Torkel Bjørnskau to BA.

In Oslo, the Accident and Injury Service has in recent years collected figures on patients who come in with injuries after cycling accidents.

– It turns out that the number of bicycle injuries is 20 times higher than the official accident figures show, says the researcher, and adds:

– So there are many more accidents than you think.

Must register where and how

The reason for the big gap is that also very serious, which are usually not registered by the police.

Then they don’t end up in the official traffic accident statistics, Bjørnskau points out.

TØI will do something about the large under-reporting. Almost two years ago, they adopted a digital registration tool at emergency rooms and hospitals in Agder. Last year, Drammen and Kongsberg were included.

From 1 May, all patients who enter the Bergen emergency department and the Accident and Injury Clinic at Bergen Health Center will be given the opportunity to register their injury.

Patients who come to the Emergency Department and the Trauma Center at Haukeland are also tried to be intercepted.

The project, which is also being launched in a number of other Norwegian cities and towns, has been named CyWalk.

Patients will be greeted with posters in waiting rooms asking: Have you been injured on foot, on a bicycle, on a scooter or similar?

If the answer is yes, you are encouraged to scan the QR code on the poster and fill in a questionnaire, explains Bjørnskau.

– In the form, you can register where, when and how the damage occurred. There is also a field where you can write a little about what happened.

The system has worked well where it has been used, says the TØI researcher.

– We see that people are very interested in telling about their accident, says Bjørnskau.

– Aim to prevent

The aim of registering these accidents is to prevent injuries, he explains.

– If we see that there are places where there are more accidents, we put up the camera to look at behavior and risk. This provides important information such as the road authorities can use to improve solutions and introduce measures that prevent accidents.

Head of department at the Bergen Emergency Department, Trond Inselseth, and head of department at the Accident and Injury Clinic of Health Bergen, Torbjørn Hiis Bergh, are both positive about the project.

– This will give us an overview of where in the cityscape soft road users in Bergen injure themselves. We haven’t had that before, says Inselseth.

The two agree that it is an advantage in terms of resource use for the patients themselves to register the injuries.

– We will probably encourage the relevant patients to register. I think mAnge is interested in reporting his own injury and experiences, says Hiis Bergh.

Like TØI researcher Bjørnskau, the doctors believe that the data can be useful.

– Urban planners will, via this data, be able to see which points in the cityscape are accident-prone and take measures based on that, says Inselseth.

– This is important for the prevention of injuries. It will take some time before we get the data, but I hope that in the short term it will benefit the citizens, adds Hiis Bergh.

– Skeptical

BA meets teacher Ann Elisabeth Husa at Skadepoliklinikken. She is going for a check-up after breaking her ankle at work.

Husa is positive about the possibility for patients to register their own accident.

– It sounds reasonable that you can scan a QR code and fill in a form that leads to an overview of where and how accidents happen, she says.

Malin Winter and her partner Truls Olsen also say they will use the form to report their own accidents, but:

– I am skeptical as to whether it will lead to actual measures, says Winter, while the roommate nods.

Expect to find accident points

The Urban Environment Agency in Bergen Municipality believes that the data collected will provide them with an important, new knowledge base.

– We expect that some accident points may emerge where we will be able to take simpler measures through the project, says section leader Marina Magerøy.

She mentions measures such as adapting the operation, submerging edges, paving, lighting and marking, as well as introducing slow-down zones for electric scooters.

– The collection of data will also be an important basis for us in preventive traffic safety work and the planning of major infrastructure measures, points out Magerøy.