Does the mechanism of injury in pediatric blunt trauma patients correlate with the severity of genitourinary organ injury?

Introduction: Blunt abdominal trauma can result in injury to genitourinary (GU) organs. Children may be more susceptible to some GU injuries due to anatomic differences compared to adults. Mechanism of injury (MOI) has been thought to relate to both the likelihood and severity of GU injury in children, although this has not definitively been proven. Our purpose was to determine if MOI has any correlation to the severity of GU injury in children treated at our institution. Materials and methods: We reviewed records of all pediatric blunt trauma patients presenting to our institution from January 2005-December 2010 using the LeBonheur Children's Hospital Trauma Registry. All patients with GU injuries were included in this study. Data collected included demographic information, MOI, type and grade of GU injury, associated injuries, and clinical outcome. Continuous variables were tested with ANOVA and categorical variables were tested with chi-square test. Results: Records of 5151 children with blunt trauma were reviewed; 76 patients were found to have GU organ injury. There were 47 males (61.8%) and 29 females (38.2%). Categories of MOI included motor vehicle accident, sports injury, bicycle accident, all-terrain vehicle accident (ATV), pedestrian struck accident, falls, and animal injury. MOI did not have any statistically significant association with the severity of GU organ injury (p = 0.5159). In addition, there was no association between MOI and either gender or side of injury. There was a statistically significant association between MOI and patient age (p = 0.04); older pediatric patients were more likely to experience GU injury due to sports injury and ATV accidents, where as younger patients were more likely to experience GU injury due to pedestrian struck, bicycle accidents or animal bite. Conclusions: Although specific MOI would seem to relate to presence and severity of injury in children, MOI alone does not correlate with the severity of GU organ injury in our pediatric trauma population. Age of pediatric patients is associated with the type of MOI that results in GU organ injury. The possibility of GU injury should be considered in all symptomatic pediatric patients with clinically significant blunt trauma regardless of the exact MOI.