Interesting Whiplash Statistics

As you might have read in another blog post, I had the opportunity last year to receive a certification in Whiplash and Brain Injury Traumatology. It’s amazing how many people think that whiplash is caused only by car accidents and how they do not know the trouble that whiplash can cause long-term to their bodies. Here are a few statistics, you might find interesting:

• Approximately 15 to 40 percent of those injured in automobile accidents will struggle with chronic pain for the rest of their life. Journal of the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons, 2007
• Whiplash injuries not only increase your chances of chronic neck and shoulder pain, they also increase the probability of other unrelated health problems. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 2001
• Chronic Pain can be debilitating. According to standardized assessment tests, people struggling with chronic pain, caused by whiplash injuries, have abnormal psychological profiles. The only way to resolve these abnormal psychological profiles is to relieve / remove the chronic back pain, neck pain and headaches. Pain, 1997
• The longest-running study ever done on whiplash patients looked at the overall health of whiplash patients almost 20 years after their automobile accident. More than 50 percent of those patients still deal with chronic pain. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 2002
• One in 100 people around the world suffer from ongoing chronic neck pain due to an automobile-induced whiplash injury. Injury, 2005
• One in 50 people injured in a whiplash-like accident deal with chronic pain severe enough to need diagnostic testing, medications, and doctor visits, on an ongoing basis ----- nearly eight years after the accident occurs. Pain, 1994

Interesting stats, huh? Whiplash is the most commonly used term for what happens when your head and neck suddenly accelerates and is “whipped” back with deceleration. More than 3 million new cases of whiplash occur each year and more than 50 percent of those progress to some degree of chronic symptoms. As I mentioned, whiplash is commonly caused in even the most minor of car accidents, however, it can also happen in sports, work injuries and other accidents that may “snap” your head suddenly and violently.