Top 10 Risks of Injury In The United States

accidents arp death liability risk risk management umbrella liability whitecoat Aug 27, 2019

Risk management is the practice of helping reduce a bad outcome in your life. While we typically think of risk management as using insurance as a way of helping reduce the financial impact of a bad event in your life, the fact is this: Financial protection is important, but protecting your life and health from untoward events, is even more important.

At WhiteCoat Risk Management, our A.R.P. system helps people better identify, reduce and protect against the risks in their life. Sometimes it's financial, but other times it helps you protect your life and health. This is one of those times.

Risks Of Injury: Knowledge Is Power.

If you knew that you had a high chance of being injured this year, would you be better off understanding what the most likely cause of that injury would be? Or are you better off not knowing and taking your chances?

I believe the answer is obvious. If you know the most likely cause of an injury, then you can take appropriate action to help reduce or eliminate the potential for that injury. You still won't know how, when or if it will happen, but knowing the most likely sources of injury gives you a better chance of avoiding them. Nothing can reduce all chance of injury, but understanding the most common sources of injury can play a large part in reducing the change of injury to yourself and your family.

The Risk Of Injury Is More Than Just Hurting Yourself

In the US, a person dies from an injury about every 3 minutes. That is over 200,000 deaths each year. But that's not the full story. For each injury-related death, there are approximately 140 additional people who are injured and require treatment, either in an emergency room or admission into a hospital. That's around 28 million injured people each year. A staggering number. And full recovery from an injury is not guaranteed, with many people suffering from the residual impact of those injuries, sometimes for the remainder of their life. So doesn't it make sense to understand what is the cause of most of those injuries?

Center For Disease Control Statistics

Recently in a MDLinx article on injury, Naveed Saleh, MD reviewed the top 10 injuries as reported by the CDC in 2017, based on ICD-10 codes. Let's review what was highlighted and learn from it.

10. Land transport other than motor vehicles (eg, ATV or animal-drawn vehicle)

Number of deaths: 1,332

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 0.8%

9. Otherwise specified injuries that are classifiable (eg, crush injuries, unspecified electric current, or explosion)

Number of deaths: 1,440

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 0.8%

8. Natural/environmental causes

Number of deaths: 1,750

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 1.0%

7. Fire/burn

Number of deaths: 2,902

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 1.7%

6. Drowning

Number of deaths: 3,709

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 2.2%

5. Unspecified

Number of deaths: 6,606

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 3.9%

4. Suffocation

Number of deaths: 6,946

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 4.1%

3. Fall

Number of deaths: 36,338

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 21.4%

2. Motor vehicle traffic (eg, motor vehicle, motorcycle, or pedestrian death)

Number of deaths: 38,659

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 22.7%

1. Poisoning

Number of deaths: 64,795

Percentage of total injury-related deaths: 38.1%

Of note, all other causes of unintentional injury-related death accounted for 3.2% of the 2017 total (5,459 cases). Also See: Top 10 causes of death in the US

Risk Reduction

Using the ARP system of WhiteCoat Risk Management, we have the benefit of the CDC doing the Assessment portion of the system for us. Reduction of that risk is up to us.

Looking at these numbers, there are some obvious areas where a bit of attention could make a big difference. Poisoning can be reduced by helping eliminate or reduce the access that small children have to household products and medications. MVA may be difficult to reduce, but such simple things as safe driving habits, using seatbelts and child seats and driving courtesy can go a long way to reduce your risk. Falls, suffocation, fire and drowning around your home or place of work can be reduced by using common sense and looking at specific opportunities to reduce those risks by changes in the environment, tools or our activities.

Last, financial protection from those causes of accidental death should be addressed by anyone with a reasonable amount of financial assets. While we don't wish any of these accidents on anyone, we do understand that such accidents do occur and may result in a significant financial risk to you. In order to be protected by an insurance policy, it must be in effect prior to the injury or death. Once such an event occurs, it's too late to get the appropriate coverage to protect you. You must do it proactively.

One reasonable option for anyone is the addition of an Umbrella Liability Policy on top of your normal homeowners or business liability policy. It can provide a significant amount of additional protection at an affordable price. Contact WCRM for more information about this, and other risk mitigation strategies.

WhiteCoat Risk Management provides these articles to help improve general risk awareness in all aspects of your life. It is not responsible for any actions you take or fail to take regarding any aspect of your financial planning or risk management. This article is provided for information purposes and is not intended to provide individualized advice. You alone are responsible for your decisions.

Visit or contact WhiteCoat Risk Management at www.WhiteCoatRiskManagement.com or join us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WhiteCoatRisk/

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