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10 Facts About Whiplash

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  1. In a series of recent  low speed rear impact crash tests with human volunteers, researchers found the threshold for cervical spine soft tissue injury was 5 mph.
  2. Other reports have shown that crashed cars can often withstand collision speeds of 10 mph or more without sustaining damage. Thus: the concept of “no crush, no cash” is simply not valid.
  3. Recent epidemiological studies have shown that most injury rear impact accidents occur at crash speeds of 6 mph to 12 mph –the majority at speeds below the threshold for property damage to the vehicle.
  4. These risk factors increase your risk of injury in a rear impact collision: loss of cervical lordotic curve, pre-existing arthritic changes, the use of seat belts and shoulder harness (at slow speeds), poor head restraint geometry, non-awareness of the impending collision, female gender, and head rotation at impact.
  5. Once thought to suggest minimal injury, a delay in onset of symptoms has been shown to be the norm, rather than the exception.
  6. Mild traumatic brain injury can result from whiplash trauma. Often, the symptoms are referred to as the post-concussion syndrome. This condition, often denied in the past, has now been well-validated in recent medical literature.
  7. An outcome study of whiplash patients reported in the European Spine Journal found that between one and two years post injury, 22% of patients’ conditions deteriorated. This second wave of symptoms has also been observed by others researchers.
  8. A study that followed whiplash patients through time reported that 45% remained symptomatic at 12 weeks, and 25% were symptomatic at 6 months. Other researchers have reported time to recovery in the most minor of cases at 8 weeks; time to stabilization in the more severe cases at 17 weeks; and time to plateau in the most severe categories as 20.5 weeks. Thus, the notion that whiplash injuries heal in 6-12 weeks is challenged. (Incidentally, there never has been any real support for this common myth.)
  9. Of the 31 important whiplash outcome studies published since 1956 (19 published since 1990) pooling patients from all vectors of collision (i. e., rear, frontal, and side impacts), a mean of 40% report long-term symptoms. For those in rear-impact collisions, that data indicate around 59% remain symptomatic in the long-term.
  10. Although estimates vary, about 10% of all whiplash victims become disabled in some capacity.