TOOTHBRUSH INJURIES Is it a brush with danger?
Many such injuries aren't reported, one researcher says.
SCRIPPS HOWARD
Toothbrushes -- use them at your own risk.
They may look harmless with their soft bristles and Winnie-the-Pooh hand grips, but don't be fooled. A new government study found that about 2,500 people a year are treated in hospital emergency rooms for injuries incurred while using a toothbrush.
And that doesn't even count the hapless brushers who seek more private treatment for their injuries -- primarily oral lacerations -- at a doctor's office or a medical clinic.
The total number of toothbrush-related injuries is probably much higher, "but we aren't able to account for them all because they are not reported," said Dr. Brockton Hefflin, a researcher at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and lead author of a study on injuries involving medical devices. It's to be published in the next issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
Where the problem lies
But don't blame the toothbrush -- the problem is overwhelmingly one of operator error. The typical injury involves brushing teeth with a manual -- not electric or battery-operated -- toothbrush while engaged in a secondary activity, "like running down a hallway, tripping and falling," Hefflin said.
Another scenario: Brushers who became "involved in altercations" while tending to their teeth, Hefflin said. In other words, if you're going to get into a fistfight, take the toothbrush out of your mouth first.
The study is based on the Consumer Product Safety Commission's database of injuries treated at 100 hospital emergency rooms statistically selected to represent 5,000 hospitals across the country.
After reviewing ER records for injuries treated between July 1999 and June 2000, researchers estimated that 454,383 people suffered injuries involving the use of medical devices during that period, including 2,489 toothbrush mishaps.
About 13 percent of medical-device injuries overall required hospitalization, but there was no breakdown for toothbrush injuries. "I doubt any of them required hospitalization," Hefflin said.
Nor were there any brushing deaths that he knew of, Hefflin said. Less than one in every 1,000 of the device injuries overall was fatal, he said.
Other injuries
Of the 60 categories of medical devices included in the study, motorized wheelchairs and scooters accounted for the largest number of injuries -- 179,631 -- Hefflin said. Most of those injuries involved lacerations, contusions and sprains incurred in falls from the vehicles, he said.
The second-most-frequent category of medical device involved in injuries was "crutches, canes and walkers," accounting for about 15 percent of total injuries, Hefflin said.