PATTERNS OF INJURIES ASSOCIATED WITH THE USE OF AIRBAGS

Experimental studies have shown that in traffic accidents with frontal impact the new airbag system can significantly reduce the incidence o f severe injuries and fatal outcome. The question of whether the airba g itself induces specific patterns of injury needs further investigati on, Two cases of traffic accidents with airbag protection are presente d here. The first case report clearly shows the life-saving and injury -reducing effect of the airbag system in a traffic accident with front al impact at 100 km/h. In the second case only minor injuries of the f ace were diagnosed initially. Hemodynamic instability occurred after 3 h of hospitalization due to rupture of the azygos vein. Analysis of t he presented cases shows that, besides the well-known benefits, there are certain injury patterns that seem to be related to the use of airb ags. These have not been described before. It is concluded that patien ts who were involved in traffic accidents with airbag deployment have to be hospitalized and followed up carefully over time, even though th ey are initially stable, as potentially fatal sequelae of deceleration trauma can occur later, in our opinion it is not possible to estimate the severity of airbag-associated injuries with conventional methods.