VALIDITY OF HOSPITAL DISCHARGE DATA REGARDING INTENTIONALITY OF FATALPEDIATRIC INJURIES

This study of hospitalized fatal injuries to children in New York City (1991-1992) compares the classification of injury intention on hospit al discharge data with that on death certificates in 302 injuries for which records could be linked. Using death certificates as the criteri on, the sensitivity of hospital data for identifying intentional injur ies ranged from 0.50 for children under age 5 years [95% confidence in terval (CI) = 0.27-0.73] to 0.85 for adolescents (95% CI = 0.80-0.90), and from 0.75 for white children (95% CI = 0.65-0.83) to 0.89 for non white children (95% CI = 0.82-0.93). Hospital discharge data for this population appear to understate both the incidence and the proportion of fatal injuries due to intentional causes; particularly those occurr ing to very young children and to white children.