Low speed auto collisions still lead to injuries.
Research shows that neck pain and injury can occur in an auto/car accident regardless of the speed of the collision. Volvo did a research study in 2000 to find out which types of pain were most common in rear impact collisions and at what speeds symptoms began to be manifested. They tallied the results from 25,000 rear impact collisions with 45,000 occupants and found that the most common symptom was neck pain. More significant however, was that similar neck pain occurred in collisions that were between 2 km/h and 25 km/h. They also found that after 25 km/h there was more crush damage to the vehicle and that the seat backs began to fail. Both the crush and the failing of the seat backs actually translated into less neck pain injury due to less forces transferred to the occupant in the collision.
What does this mean?
There is no good relationship between the speed of the collision and neck pain or injury.
In many cases insurance companies make the argument that people who are involved in low speed collisions cannot be injured. Well…research shows, it just isn’t so!
-Dr. McKnight