Epidemiological Study of Factitious Injuries in Traffic Accidents in Ilam City, Iran

In some cases, people claim to use insurance compensation services by causing factitious injuries. The aim of this study was to investigate the epidemiology of factitious injuries in traffic accidents in Ilam legal medicine cases, Ilam, Iran.

The data of this cross-sectional study was collected by census method from 100 cases of factitious injuries detected in traffic accidents that were diagnosed by forensic experts of Ilam city, Iran from the beginning of March 2018 to the end of February 2020. data included age, sex, education, occupation, marriage, accommodation, type of accident, location of the injured in the accident, place of the accident, time of the accident, date of the accident, location and type of injuries. binomial and Chi-square statistical tests were used to assess the significance of the research hypotheses.

In this study, 81% of the cases were men. 68% of people were 21 to 40 years old, 82% had no university education, 53% were self-employed and 75% were urban dwellers. 43% of accidents were overturned or deviated, and 39% occurred on interurban roads. 43% of people with a passenger position were present in the accident. 50% of accidents occurred in the night and early morning hours. 60% of the injuries were accidental and 71% of the people had real injuries in addition to factitious injuries.

According to this study, the age group of 21-40 years old, without university education, urbanization, rollover or road deviation type accidents and on intercity roads at night and early morning are the risk factors of creating factitious injuries. Injuries of the Harseh type and in the form of a mix with real injuries are also a risk factor of factitious injuries. Due to the lack of significant relationship between the place of injury, all parts of the body can be the place of factitious injuries.