Bottom Line: SafetyLit.Org Offers Vast Field of Knowledge

By David Lawrence, Director of the Center for Injury Prevention Policy and
Practice at San Diego State University
April 2008

While it is seldom possible to prevent all events (vehicle crashes, falls, etc.) that have potential to cause injury, it is often possible to prevent these things from causing serious harm. Individuals and communities can prevent injuries through knowledge of risks, sensible behaviors, and the use of safe, well-designed products and environments.

One or more strategies must be sensibly adapted and applied in each risk situation. The application of countermeasures, in terms of acceptability, feasibility and practicality, must be determined through knowledge from many disciplines.

A vast field of knowledge is available to support the work of policy-makers, practitioners and researchers in the field of injury prevention and safety promotion (IPSP). At least 35 distinct professions contribute information. However, few professionals use more than a small portion of the information they could. A look at the reference lists of articles relevant to IPSP will demonstrate that the authors usually limit their citations to the product of only one or two of the many professions. For almost 100 years IPSP practice has been said to be most successful when the 3 Es (education, engineering, and enforcement of regulations and laws) are applied. Alas, much of the IPSP literature and many projects don’t even use all of the Es, much less knowledge provided by the many other professions.

Why aren’t we exposed to a broader knowledge base? There are several issues that contribute to this problem. Unlike most other disciplines for which a complete literature search may be performed using a single on-line database, information relevant to IPSP issues is scattered across several databases -- each with its own arcane search system. To search effectively often requires knowledge and training in the techniques needed to perform a comprehensive yet focused search. Authors write for those who do similar work and have a similar background. If we seek information from other professions we quickly find that our quest is difficult. Although many in the IPSP field may use PubMed and, perhaps, one or two other literature databases; few are even aware of the many other resources.

Thus, if we aren't careful, we can miss relevant, even critical, information in parallel or disparate fields. Prevention practitioners, researchers, and policy-makers may have insufficient information to make sound decisions concerning resource allocation priorities. Decisions that are based upon incomplete information are likely to waste time, work effort, and money -- especially if that information is gathered only from a few familiar sources. Poor decision-making can block interventions needed to prevent injuries, disabilities, and deaths. At best, poor decision-making is likely to not only delay implementation of useful projects but also diminish the resources available for proper interventions after unsound programs fail.
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Entering a few search words into PubMed’s Web site will return a satisfying large number or articles. However, unless the search terms were selected carefully the list will miss many key articles. For example, if you want to find articles on drinking and driving, you might look up the “official” PubMed search terms (called medical subject headings or MeSH) related to this topic. You quickly find two MeSH terms that seem to be what you need: “alcohol drinking” and “automobile driving”. A search with these two terms will produce a long list of articles but it will omit many more relevant articles. Many of the articles specifically about driving under the influence aren’t indexed with the term “automobile driving” but with the term “psychomotor performance”. Who but a librarian with special training would know this?

The focus of PubMed is biomedicine and index terms are assigned with this in mind. It isn’t the primary purpose of PubMed to facilitate finding articles about injury prevention. Thus, many important journals aren't included in PubMed. A similar problem exists with most of the other databases. With one exception, no literature database includes all journals that publish articles relevant to IPSP. The exception is SafetyLit.
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SafetyLit is a free service of the Center for Injury Prevention Policy & Practice at San Diego State University in collaboration with the World Health Organization. SafetyLit staff and volunteers regularly examine more than 2600 journals and scores of reports from government agencies and organizations from many nations. SafetyLit is available in two forms:

The weekly SafetyLit Update Bulletin provides summaries of recently published reports relevant to preventing unintentional injuries, violence, and self-harm -- about 100 articles are included each week. This Bulletin is available through email and via 20 topic-specific RSS feeds.

SafetyLit maintains a searchable archive of material published in the past. We have expanded the SafetyLit archive to include the complete backfiles (beginning with Volume 1, Issue 1) of several key journals from the IPSP field. These include Accident Analysis and Prevention; Alcohol, Drugs and Driving; Human Factors; IATSS Research; Injury Prevention; International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion; Journal of Applied Fire Science; Journal of Consumer Product Flammability, Journal of Fire and Flammability, Journal of Fire Sciences Journal of Safety Research; Journal of Traffic Medicine; Safety Science; Traffic Injury Prevention; Transportation Human Factors; Transportation Research: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour; and several other journals.

For more information about SafetyLit visit: www.SafetyLit.org

Biosketch
David Lawrence is director of the Center for Injury Prevention Policy and Practice at San Diego State University. He has worked in the fields of injury prevention and public health since the mid-1970s as an EMT/paramedic, a registered nurse, an epidemiologist, and a program administrator. David is currently serving as editor of SafetyLit, an on-line update containing summaries of journal articles on topics relevant to injury prevention and safety promotion. He may be reached at: David.Lawrence@SDSU.edu.