A seat belt in non-motorised vehicle rickshaw—can it prevent roads traffic injuries in Bangladesh?. (7th October 2012) - Biswas, A
Abstract : Background: Road traffic accident in urban settings of Bangladesh is often occurs. Specially, three wheeler non-motorised passenger carriers named rickshaw causes mortality and morbidity includes longer duration of hospital stay, psychological stress, economic burden, social deprivation and disability. Objectives: To know the perception of community people on rickshaw injuries and it's prevention, to explore feasibility, uses and compliance of new safety devices to prevent injuries due to rickshaw accidents and to observe the acceptability of the safety device among the community people. Methods: Both qualitative and quantitative methods were used. Group discussions were conducted to know people perception include rickshaw puller and prevention measures. Experimental study was applied by installation of seat belt in rickshaw and compare with other safety devices. Observational study also performed to see its acceptability. Results: Community people perceived that simple safety device can prevent rickshaw injuries; it will be useful for children and older. We installed seat belt in a dummy rickshaw, compare with other devices Shock absorbing device on the rear bumper and Metallic spring device on the rear bumper. Observational findings showed that 27.8% used seat belt during travel (n=36) in dummy rickshaw, 60% user had a child with a female. Significance: Seat belt found useful safety device in prevent rickshaw injuries and also accepted by users.