TOPLINE:

A retrospective analysis revealed that 38,720 emergency department (ED) visits occurred for injuries from automatic doors between 2015 and 2024, and older adults faced triple the risk for severe injuries compared with adults. Children and adults mainly sustained upper-extremity injuries, whereas most older adults had head/face/neck injuries.

METHODOLOGY:

• Researchers conducted a descriptive, retrospective observational study of patients who visited an ED for any type of injury from automatic doors or automatic garage doors between 2015 and 2024, using data from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System.
• Primary outcomes were 10-year trends of such injuries and the total number of related ED visits during the same period.
• Secondary outcomes included demographic characteristics, injury patterns, ED disposition, and the location of incident.

TAKEAWAY:

• The total weighted number of ED visits was 38,720 in 10 years, including 11.1% pediatric cases (mean age, 6.97 years; 63.8% boys; 53.9% White), 52.4% adult cases (mean age, 44.37 years; 54.2% men; 52.4% White), and 36.5% older adult cases (mean age, 78.21 years; 46.5% men; 61.6% White).
• The incidence of injuries peaked in 2015, then declined, but rose again in 2023-2024. Injuries that occurred in 2020 (adjusted odds ratio [OR], 4.79; P = .0268) and 2024 (adjusted OR, 5.10; P = .0394) were more severe than those that occurred in 2015. Older adults had higher odds (adjusted OR, 3.18; P = .0041) but children had lower odds (adjusted OR, 0.03; P = .0096) of severe injuries than adults.
• Children and adults mostly had upper-extremity injuries (56.8% and 44.7%, respectively), whereas older adults more often sustained head/face/neck (39.1%) and trunk/internal (23.8%) injuries. Upper-extremity injuries (adjusted OR, 0.094; P < .0001) and head/face/neck injuries (adjusted OR, 0.095; P = .003) were less severe than trunk/internal injuries.
• Pediatric injuries occurred more commonly in public/other locations (54.5%), and adult injuries (54.5%) occurred mainly at home; injuries that occurred in school were less severe than those that occurred at home (OR, 0.003; P ≤ .01). Rates of hospital admission were highest among older adults (18.4%), compared with 4.2% among adults and 0% among children , and most patients across all groups were discharged.

IN PRACTICE:

"While adults represented the majority of cases, older adults experienced disproportionately higher rates of severe injury and hospital admissions, underscoring their vulnerability to this mechanism of trauma," the authors wrote. "[Our] findings highlight the need for enhanced safety mechanisms, targeted prevention strategies, and regulatory oversight to reduce burden on the emergency departments," they added.

SOURCE:

The study was led by Vadym Shapovalov, MD, Lehigh Valley Health Network, Allentown, Pennsylvania. It was published online on October 24 in The American Journal of Emergency Medicine.

LIMITATIONS:

The use of publicly available data introduced potential reporting bias and a high risk for misrepresented or unreported information. As only ED visits were included, injuries treated in urgent care, outpatient clinics, or left untreated were not captured, potentially underestimating the true prevalence of such injuries, limiting generalizability, and skewing the data toward more severe injuries. The National Electronic Injury Surveillance System lacked standardized injury severity scores, limiting the ability to compare trauma severity among patients. 

DISCLOSURES:

The study did not receive any funding. The authors reported having no conflicts of interest.

This article was created using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication.