Mountain Biking

MTB casualties requiring SAR

assistance in Snowdonia:an 11-year case series

Photo Courtesy of www.howardwilkinsonphotography.co.uk

www.mountainmedicine.co.ukIntroduc)on

Mountain bike (MTB) casual3es in inaccessible loca3ons in Snowdonia o7en require Search & Rescue (SAR) services to locate & extract them.

We wished to ascertain the nature and severity of injuries in this cohort.

Method

Our database of all mountain casual3es brought to Bangor hospital following contact with Mountain Rescue and/or SAR helicopter between 1/1/2004-31/12/2014 was interrogated, ED records scru3nised and Injury Severity Scores (ISS) calculated.

Results

No pa3ents required transfer to a Major Trauma Centre.

Conclusion

The shoulder is the most commonly injured body region in MTB riders in Snowdonia who required SAR assistance.

Signicant injuries were unusual, and there were no deaths as a result of trauma in our 11-year series.

From 1180 casual3es on the database, 25 MTB cases were iden3ed.

Most (n=22, 88%) were male with a mean age of 34 (range 5-54).

12 casual3es were using a designated MTB track at the 3me of injury, and the majority of injuries were sustained riding on level ground (n=8) or whilst going downhill (n=7).

One casualty died, unfortunately experiencing a cardiac arrest whilst pushing a bicycle uphill.

The commonest injuries were to the shoulder area with four casual3es sustaining clavicle fractures, plus one ACJ disrup3on.

Next most common were wrist injuries, with 4 distal radius and/or ulna fractures.

Three sustained ankle fractures and two had pelvic fractures (one through body of the ilium).

There was one trauma3c subarachnoid haemorrhage.

One pa3ent suered a thoracic vertebral body fracture. Four casual3es, ini3ally suspected to have serious injuries, had only minor so7 3ssue injuries.

The Injury Severity Score (ISS) range in the cohort was 1-17, with a mean of 4.5 & a median of 4: the most severely-injured case was a 5-year old child who had ridden a bike into a 100-foot ravine (thankfully wooded!) & sustained chest injuries.

Dr Nick Brazel Dr Andrew Muirhead-SmithClinical Fellows in EM/PHEM

Dr Linda Dykes Consultant in EMYsbyty GwyneddBangor, Wales