Impact of a Celebrity Death on Children's Injury-related Emergency Room Visits

Objectives: To determine whether a sharp increase in Emergency Room (ER) visits at the Montreal Children's Hospital (MCH) during the week following the death of Natasha Richardson from a skiing-related head injury was a) statistically significant and b) related to media coverage of the event. W...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Canadian journal of public health 2010-03, Vol.101 (2), p.115-118
Main Authors: Keays, Glenn, Pless, I.B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Actors
Actresses
Biological and medical sciences
Brain
Celebrities
Child
Child health services
Children
Children & youth
Children's hospitals
Craniocerebral trauma
Craniocerebral Trauma - epidemiology
Death
Death of
Emergency departments
Emergency medical care
Emergency medical services
Emergency medicine
Emergency service
Emergency Service, Hospital - statistics & numerical data
Epidemiology
Famous Persons
Fatalities
Forecasts and trends
General aspects
Head
Head injuries
Hospitals
Humans
Injuries
Journalism
Mass Media
Media coverage
Medical care
Medical sciences
Medicine
Medicine & Public Health
Miscellaneous
Mortality
Parents & parenting
Parents - psychology
Patient Acceptance of Health Care - psychology
Patient Acceptance of Health Care - statistics & numerical data
Pediatrics
Physical trauma
Public Health
Public health. Hygiene
Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine
QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH
Quebec - epidemiology
Richardson, Natasha
Statistical analysis
Suicide
Trauma Severity Indices
User statistics
Utilization
Wounds and Injuries - epidemiology
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Items that cite this one
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Summary:Objectives: To determine whether a sharp increase in Emergency Room (ER) visits at the Montreal Children's Hospital (MCH) during the week following the death of Natasha Richardson from a skiing-related head injury was a) statistically significant and b) related to media coverage of the event. We postulated that there would be less coverage in the French media and in centres west of Quebec. Methods: We compared the number of visits to the MCH ER for 10 weeks beginning March 5 and recorded the number for head-related injuries. These data were also compared with averages for the MCH for the same weeks in the previous 16 years; with visit figures from Hôpital Ste-Justine (HSJ); and with those from 3 other pediatrie hospitals in provinces west of Quebec for the same period. Results: We found a 60% increase in injury visits to the MCH ER compared to the baseline week (p
ISSN:0008-4263
1920-7476
DOI:10.1007/BF03404354