Initiative details
We have been and continue to address issues associated with road accidents and medical treatments and are creating a process and methodology for data export. The results are the basis for injury prevention work.
Initiative date
to
Who was/is your target audience?
Policy makers
Public authorities
Children 0-16
Educational staff
Public transport
Cyclists
Micromobility riders
Powered two wheeler riders (excluding micromobility)
Pedestrians
Topic
Create awareness
Education in school or in community organizations
Organisation details
Research Center for Childhood Accidents at Safe Kids Austria
Association
Austria
Graz / Styria
Contact name
Peter Spitzer
Telephone number
+4331638513398
peter.spitzer@uniklinikum.kages.at
Project activities
If you work together with external partners, list the most important partners and briefly describe their role.
*Medicine: Medical University of Graz, Department of Paediatric and Adolescent Surgery - Hospital records and data set
*Politics: Styrian Government, Department for Road Safety - Funding, Enforcement
*Education: University College of Teacher Education of Styria, Styrian Department of Education - further education of teachers, Dissemination; Austrian Ministry of Education, Austrian Network for Traffic Safety Education – Dissemination
*Politics: Styrian Government, Department for Road Safety - Funding, Enforcement
*Education: University College of Teacher Education of Styria, Styrian Department of Education - further education of teachers, Dissemination; Austrian Ministry of Education, Austrian Network for Traffic Safety Education – Dissemination
Please describe the project activities you carried/are carrying out and the time period over which these were implemented.
After 4 years of effort (2011-2014) to gain the exclusive rights to work in (nearly) real time on data sets and perform analyses of these data, we began conducting continuous research work in 2015.
We create reports on traffic safety issues and create safety projects, which communicate safety solutions to the people who are affected by these kind of accidents.
Via our “sister” Safe Kids Austria and its local network, we are able to communicate outcomes of the injury prevention projects to those who are concerned here and now.
We focus on the following:
*Conducting research on vulnerable road users
*Creating basic data sets (hospital integrated system called StiSS Styrian Injury Surveillance System)
*Carrying out AI-driven analyses and face-to-face interviews to determine individual circumstances
*Discussing and reflecting on results with Safe Kids Austria - the powerful partner for injury prevention projects
*Developing projects
*Cooperating with politicians - especially traffic safety dept for funding
*Disseminating information about our roles or projects by holding press conferences
*Carrying out projects
*Disseminating project outcomes
*Transfers these outcomes into everyday traffic safety education
Research Highway
2011-2014: Building the Data Highway - Implementation of Research Instruments
2015 – Ongoing: StISS – The Styrian Injury Surveillance System Dataset for quantitative and qualitative analysis
2017: Protect Me – Moped Safety (Data Report)
2017: Tune It – Moped Safety (Data Report)
2019: MOPED DRIVING. How Should We Address Moped Mobility?
(Data Report) (Data Report)
2020: Children on Wheels - Mobile on Wheels. Muscle + Electric + Motor Power (Data Report)
2021: Ablenkung als Unfallfaktor Nummer 1 - Distraction (Data Report)
2022: An Overview of Bus & Tram Accidents (Data Report)
2023: See and be seen. Accidents occurring in blind spots and due to impaired visibility (Data Report)
2022 – 2023 Working on AI-solutions for analysing the anamneses and transfer written diagnosis in ICD coding.
2015 – Ongoing: Sharing of knowledge: (all reports for download available at homepage)
Safety Highway
2018: Parking Deck Hospital (local awareness campaign)
2021: Video Workshop High School BG Rein (Safe School: local project, high school)
2021 – Ongoing: eLearning Homepage for Blended Learning support for projects mentioned above
2021 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Safety on the Streets (toolbox for traffic safety education at school, primary and secondary school)
2022: Sch(l)au voraus – Think Ahead! (performance at school, primary school)
2022 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Sure-footed on the Road (toolbox for traffic safety education at school, primary and secondary school)
2022/2023: The Safety Calendar – Monthly Topic (awareness campaign)
2022 - Ongoing: Workshop Trend Sport – Scooter and Inline Skates (workshop for traffic safety education, primary school)
2023 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Blind Spot Alarm (toolbox for traffic safety education, primary and secondary school)
We create reports on traffic safety issues and create safety projects, which communicate safety solutions to the people who are affected by these kind of accidents.
Via our “sister” Safe Kids Austria and its local network, we are able to communicate outcomes of the injury prevention projects to those who are concerned here and now.
We focus on the following:
*Conducting research on vulnerable road users
*Creating basic data sets (hospital integrated system called StiSS Styrian Injury Surveillance System)
*Carrying out AI-driven analyses and face-to-face interviews to determine individual circumstances
*Discussing and reflecting on results with Safe Kids Austria - the powerful partner for injury prevention projects
*Developing projects
*Cooperating with politicians - especially traffic safety dept for funding
*Disseminating information about our roles or projects by holding press conferences
*Carrying out projects
*Disseminating project outcomes
*Transfers these outcomes into everyday traffic safety education
Research Highway
2011-2014: Building the Data Highway - Implementation of Research Instruments
2015 – Ongoing: StISS – The Styrian Injury Surveillance System Dataset for quantitative and qualitative analysis
2017: Protect Me – Moped Safety (Data Report)
2017: Tune It – Moped Safety (Data Report)
2019: MOPED DRIVING. How Should We Address Moped Mobility?
(Data Report) (Data Report)
2020: Children on Wheels - Mobile on Wheels. Muscle + Electric + Motor Power (Data Report)
2021: Ablenkung als Unfallfaktor Nummer 1 - Distraction (Data Report)
2022: An Overview of Bus & Tram Accidents (Data Report)
2023: See and be seen. Accidents occurring in blind spots and due to impaired visibility (Data Report)
2022 – 2023 Working on AI-solutions for analysing the anamneses and transfer written diagnosis in ICD coding.
2015 – Ongoing: Sharing of knowledge: (all reports for download available at homepage)
Safety Highway
2018: Parking Deck Hospital (local awareness campaign)
2021: Video Workshop High School BG Rein (Safe School: local project, high school)
2021 – Ongoing: eLearning Homepage for Blended Learning support for projects mentioned above
2021 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Safety on the Streets (toolbox for traffic safety education at school, primary and secondary school)
2022: Sch(l)au voraus – Think Ahead! (performance at school, primary school)
2022 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Sure-footed on the Road (toolbox for traffic safety education at school, primary and secondary school)
2022/2023: The Safety Calendar – Monthly Topic (awareness campaign)
2022 - Ongoing: Workshop Trend Sport – Scooter and Inline Skates (workshop for traffic safety education, primary school)
2023 - Ongoing: Keep Eyes Alert - Blind Spot Alarm (toolbox for traffic safety education, primary and secondary school)
Evaluation
What has been the effect of the activities?
The year 2015 shows good numbers, which means low numbers, of traffic accidents in Austria. The performance of Styria was very good at that time.
However, in Austria in the year 2019, we have to state that that year shows the worst performance for traffic safety within this investigated period from 2015 and 2022.
The COVID-19 pandemic in combination with lockdowns affected traffic accidents, but the effect on accidents on the way to school was much more massive. Unfortunately, it was not possible to stabilise this trend, and in 2022 after two years of the COVDI-19 pandemic, the absolute numbers are on a worse, high level, similar to those seen in 2019.
The trend in 2019 reflects the impulse to work on specific traffic safety projects; the negative performance after the COVID-19 pandemic shows the necessity of intervention activities and underlines the need for ongoing action.
If we look at detailed and high-quality data, such as those obtained by using a hospital integrated surveillance system (StISS), we are able to detect (new) trends, and we can react immediately by creating and applying intervention measures based on several research activities.
To evaluate the impact of injury prevention projects, we are able to focus on a specific hospital catchment area, where in most projects have been carried out.
The hospital data give a positive outlook, which means that the numbers of scooter and bicycle accidents have stabilised, although the use of these two mobility forms is very trendy and the exposition numbers and time are still increasing. The numbers of pedestrian traffic crashes are quite low today, and we must invest resources to maintain this. In the end, we hope that the intervention projects we are carrying out and which are mostly covering 7- to 12-year-old children will have a positive effect on the young moped drivers within the next two or three years as well.
If we look at the graphs, we cannot see the effects of the interventions – described as intervention projects in this award submission – clearly in the numbers, because these interventions are based on the visible problem that the traffic accidents numbers show: The numbers of these accidents are increasing after the more positive situation observed during the years of 2015 to 2017; high numbers of accidents were observed right before the COVID-19 pandemic began, and the same high level was reached in 2022 although lower numbers of traffic accidents were observed during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.
We describe the situation before the projects and indicate that this is a reason to react, as well as a reason to intervene. The effect of these traffic safety projects will be reflected in the numbers of accidents at the earliest in two years from now.
However, in Austria in the year 2019, we have to state that that year shows the worst performance for traffic safety within this investigated period from 2015 and 2022.
The COVID-19 pandemic in combination with lockdowns affected traffic accidents, but the effect on accidents on the way to school was much more massive. Unfortunately, it was not possible to stabilise this trend, and in 2022 after two years of the COVDI-19 pandemic, the absolute numbers are on a worse, high level, similar to those seen in 2019.
The trend in 2019 reflects the impulse to work on specific traffic safety projects; the negative performance after the COVID-19 pandemic shows the necessity of intervention activities and underlines the need for ongoing action.
If we look at detailed and high-quality data, such as those obtained by using a hospital integrated surveillance system (StISS), we are able to detect (new) trends, and we can react immediately by creating and applying intervention measures based on several research activities.
To evaluate the impact of injury prevention projects, we are able to focus on a specific hospital catchment area, where in most projects have been carried out.
The hospital data give a positive outlook, which means that the numbers of scooter and bicycle accidents have stabilised, although the use of these two mobility forms is very trendy and the exposition numbers and time are still increasing. The numbers of pedestrian traffic crashes are quite low today, and we must invest resources to maintain this. In the end, we hope that the intervention projects we are carrying out and which are mostly covering 7- to 12-year-old children will have a positive effect on the young moped drivers within the next two or three years as well.
If we look at the graphs, we cannot see the effects of the interventions – described as intervention projects in this award submission – clearly in the numbers, because these interventions are based on the visible problem that the traffic accidents numbers show: The numbers of these accidents are increasing after the more positive situation observed during the years of 2015 to 2017; high numbers of accidents were observed right before the COVID-19 pandemic began, and the same high level was reached in 2022 although lower numbers of traffic accidents were observed during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.
We describe the situation before the projects and indicate that this is a reason to react, as well as a reason to intervene. The effect of these traffic safety projects will be reflected in the numbers of accidents at the earliest in two years from now.
Please briefly explain why your initiative is a good example of improving road safety.
Our analysis of traffic safety data showed the problem of a bad performance situation in Styria. The analysis of the StISS data and the road accident dataset are the basis. Analysis of data on injured children teenagers, obtained through face-to-face interviews and enable us to target specific problem areas on site and on the spot.
How have you shared information about your project and its results?
We have share information in the following ways:
*Through press conferences (regional level)
*By carrying out workshops at several schools (local level)
*By sharing information via the Safe Schools network (maintained by the workers compensation board and accessible to pupils and students, regional level), via the network of safe children community (maintained by SKA; regional level) by performing continuing education (regional level)
*Through the network Traffic Safety Education (driven by the Austrian Ministry for Education): available throughout Austria (national level) in the form of toolboxes for traffic safety education at schools
*Through press conferences (regional level)
*By carrying out workshops at several schools (local level)
*By sharing information via the Safe Schools network (maintained by the workers compensation board and accessible to pupils and students, regional level), via the network of safe children community (maintained by SKA; regional level) by performing continuing education (regional level)
*Through the network Traffic Safety Education (driven by the Austrian Ministry for Education): available throughout Austria (national level) in the form of toolboxes for traffic safety education at schools
Supporting materials
