MEDICO LEGAL EVALUATION OF FIREARMS INJURY CASES IN THE HOSPITAL EMERGENCY UNIT IN HYDERABAD, PAKISTAN: A RETROSPECTIVE SURVEY.

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the demographic, origin and seasonal pattern of firearm injury cases brought or admitted between 2014 and 2018 in the emergency units of Liaquat University Hospital, Hyderabad. Material & Methods: Cross sectional study was carried out from November 2019 to January 2020at the emergency units of Liaquat University Hospital (LUH).Retrospective forensic analysis of firearm injury cases was collected from therecords of cases reported between2014 and 2018.All the firearm injury casesregardless of age and gender were included in the study. While cases of other injuries like accident emergency, explosive injuries, stab wound etc. were excluded from the study. The data was entered and analyzed in SPSS version 22. Results: The total prevalence of firearm injury cases was 14.30% with most (30.1%) of the cases belongs to the age group 30-39 years. Majority (86.57%) of them were male. While the mean age of cases was 34.33±13.5 years. More than half of fire arm injury or gunshot cases were homicidal in origin followed by accidental and suicidal. Homicide and accident cases predominantly belongs to age range of 20-29 years while suicidal origin injury cases were prominently from 30-39 years. Extremities (50.35%) are the most common injury locationand a single bullet hole was the most common as majority (62.62%) cases had single hole entry wounds. The mortality rate in the study was 13.67%. Conclusion: The high incidence of young age adults between age (20 to 39 years) with male predominance is common in firearm injury cases. Homicidal origin of firearm injuries is very common. Extremities are the most commonly injuries regions of the body. While cases of these injuries are common in summer season especially between the months of May to August.