Injuries Reduced When Victim Intoxicated
October 16, 2009 by Marijke Durning, RN
Filed under Drink, Health
It happens a lot. We read or hear of a drunk driving crash (I refuse to call it an accident) and while the victims are severely hurt or killed, the drunk driver walks away, virtually unhurt. Or, even if hurt, they recover quickly. It always makes me wonder about the effect of alcohol on the body when it gets hurt. Now it seems, there’s proof that being drunk limits the amount of damage the body sustains in a trauma.
Researchers studied almost 8000 people who had been hurt in accidents. They were looking to see if alcohol in the body at the time of the accident had any impact on the severity of the injuries. The study findings were published in the most recent issue of the journal American Surgeon.
The researchers weren’t interested in glamorizing alcohol and hope that this study doesn’t get misinterpreted, particularly since many of the trauma victims emergency room physicians see are due to alcohol to begin with. What they were looking for is if there was a connection to alcohol reducing injuries, more research could be directed in that direction to find a way to mimic the effects of alcohol when helping patients recover.
In the end, the results showed that among the people who were drunk when injured, only 1% died, compared with 7% of sober people who died. This is leading the researchers to look to see if there is a chemical reaction that may affect the damage, limiting it somewhat.
It doesn’t seem fair that the one who drinks and causes the accidents walks away, but if this helps further research, I guess something may come out of it.
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Image: StockXchng.com
