Abstract
Introduction: Previous reports have highlighted the impact of emergent crazes such as in-line skating and micro-scooters, with attention being drawn to potential accident prevention and emergent injury patterns.
A modern craze is the Harry Potter series of books. UK sales of the latest book, The Half-Blood Prince, are estimated to reach 4 million. Given the lack of horizontal velocity, height, wheels or sharp edges we were interested to investigate the impact the books had on children’s traumatic injuries.
Methods & Materials: A retrospective review was undertaken of Children aged 7 to 15 attending the Emergency Department of our Level 1 trauma unit over the summer months of a 3 year period.
The launch dates of the most recent two books (Order of the Phoenix and The Half-Blood prince) were identified and the admissions for these weekends were compared to surrounding summer weekends and those dates in previous years.
Data were obtained from MetOffice (www.metoffice.gov.uk) to establish weather conditions recorded for each of the identified weekends. This would enable us to adjust for this as a confounding variable if necessary.
Results: The mean attendance for children aged 7 to 15 years for this period was 65.1 (median 66, standard deviation 13.289, standard error 2.771). For the two intervention weekends the attendance rate was 36 and 37. This represents a significant decrease in emergency department attendances on those weekends (p < 0.05).
MetOffice data suggested no confounding effect of weather.
Discussion & Conclusion: Harry Potter books appear to protect children from traumatic injuries. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (rospa.org.uk) is dedicated to the identification and prevention of high risk childhood activities and produce guidelines on keeping children safe. To date no research has addressed the option of ‘distraction therapy’ to prevent injuries.
Mr James Robb – BSCOS Honorary Secretary, Mr Geoffrey Mill – Host of the meeting, Mr Robin Paton – Editorial Secretary. Correspondence should be sent to BSCOS, c/o Royal College of Surgeons, 35-43 Lincoln’s Inn Fields, London, WC2A 3PN.
