Publication

Road traffic accidents continue to be an important health issue for society, both in terms of personal injury and cost. It is of great importance to reduce the number of all accidents and in particular reduce the number of fatalities and personal injuries. There is a need to understand the causes of road traffic accidents and personal injuries to be able to suggest proper and effective counter-measures. Investigations of road traffic accidents and storage of the results in databases provide one way to increase our knowledge. In-depth databases exist both internationally and in Europe. In Sweden, investigations of road crashes have been undertaken by the vehicle industry, the Swedish Road Administration, hospitals and universities for many years. The existing official databases the organisations have access to do not fulfil the demands for technology development, especially for vehicle active safety systems and understanding pre-crash conditions. Research aInMeDe at increasing road safety has a high demand on information derived from real-world traffic accident data. A need for increased knowledge about injury outcome and the long term consequences of injures was also identified. In 2007 an initiative from vehicle manufacturers, safety system suppliers, the Swedish Road Administration and universities in Sweden took off. It was run as a three-year research project called INTACT (Investigation Network and Traffic Accident Collection Techniques), and had three purposes: to develop an investigation network; to develop and evaluate an advanced methodology to collect data and analyse real-world traffic accidents and store the information in a database; and to prepare INTACT for an initiative on a European level. In 2007 sampling criteria and a set of variables as a minimum base for the accident investigations were defined. An inventory of activities and methods was used for the development of the INTACT methodology and a pilot study was performed. In 2008 methods for retrieving the data from accidents were tested and further developed in real-world on-scene and retrospective investigations. In 2009 the methodology was fine-tuned and tested in real-world on-scene investigations and the INTACT database system was finalized. A total number of 123 accidents including pilot cases and special investigations have been investigated and 110 accidents, those investigated according to a consistent methodology in phases 1 and 2, have been entered into the database. An investigation process covering all phases of a crash and all parts of the road system has been developed. The INTACT accident investigation process consists of two parts, data collection and case analysis, and both are supported by protocols and routines. Data collection consists of accident site investigation, vehicle inspections, driver interviews and retrieval of medical records. Case analysis consists of pre-crashanalysis, injury mechanism analysis, reconstructions and long term injury follow-up. A database for storage of data and an on-line manual were developed.