Man's best friend?

Dog bites represent one of the major sources of morbidity, mortality, disability, and health care cost in the United States. Man's best friend bites approximately 4.7 million people in the United States annually. Approximately 800,000 of those bitten, with more than half being children, require medical attention. To determine how serious dog bite attacks are in Nevada, the State Health Division and the Department of Agriculture collaborated on a retrospective study to evaluate the incidence of dog bite related-injuries, their public health impact, and the associated medical costs to the citizens of Nevada.

Summarized facts from this report can be found below. The entire report can be found on the Web site of the Center for Health Data and Research at: http://health2k.state.nv.us/vs/Dog Bite Report.pdf.

SUMMARY AND HIGHLIGHTS

* Inpatient hospitalizations result in billed charges of $884,053 per year due to dog bites.

* The best estimate for total hospital billing amounts, which includes both inpatient and outpatient injuries to Nevadans for dog bites over this period is $1,920,817 per year. The actual amount may be even higher since these figures represent only 90% of hospital injuries in the State, and non-hospital injuries are not included.

* The average dog bite victim in Nevada that had inpatient hospitalization spent over three days in the hospital and incurred over $10,000 in hospital charges.

* There were at least 259 persons with inpatient hospitalization from dog bites in Nevada from 1999 to 2001; there were also at least 6,761 dog bite injuries that resulted in outpatient care over the same period.

* More persons under 10 years of age were hospitalized over night due to a dog bite than 10-19 year olds, 20-29 year olds, and 30-39 year olds combined.

* The inpatient hospitalisation rate of the population for Nevadans due to dog bites was at least 4.25 per 100,000; the rate for outpatients was 110.87 per 100,000. This means outpatient injuries occurred at a rate of 26 to one to inpatient injuries.

* The outpatient hospital rate from dog bites for children less than nine years old (212.32 per 100,000) is almost double the total hospital and outpatient rate due to dog bites for all other ages combined (110.87 per 100,000).

Editor's note: Reprinted from the newsletter of the Nevada State Health Division