New Hazard report highlights changing patterns of unintentional injury among Victorian men
A new report from the Victorian Injury Surveillance Unit (VISU) at the Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) has revealed more than half-a-million injury-related hospital admissions among Victorian men over the past decade, highlighting the need for targeted injury prevention at every stage of life.
Hazard Edition 95: Unintentional Injuries in Men, Victoria 2014/15 to 2023/24 examines 528,207 hospital admissions between 2014/15 and 2023/24, providing the most comprehensive picture of how injury patterns change as men age.
The report found injury-related hospital admission rates increased by an average of 1% each year over the past decade, with the steepest increases among men aged 45–64 years and 65–74 years. Men aged 75 years-and-over experienced the highest injury burden overall, with an average annual hospital admission rate of 5,337 per 100,000 population, more than double that of any other age group.
An in-depth analysis of the most recent three years of data (2021/22–2023/24), comprising more than 170,000 unintentional injury-related hospital admissions, revealed how injury causes and outcomes differ across the adult lifespan. Falls accounted for 80% of injury admissions among men aged 75 years-and-over, while transport injuries were most common among younger men aged 15–24 years. More than one-third of transport-related injuries in this younger age group involved motorcycle riders.
The report recommends increased investment in falls prevention programs for older men, continued focus on motorcycle safety, improved support for older vulnerable road users, research into safer home DIY practices, and greater integration of injury risk assessments into chronic disease management.
The findings are based on hospital admissions recorded in the Victorian Admitted Episodes Dataset (VAED), sourced from the Victorian Department of Health.
Produced by the Victorian Injury Surveillance Unit (VISU), Hazard is a long-running publication that provides evidence to inform injury prevention policy and practice in Victoria. Associate Professor Janneke Berecki-Gisolf is the lead author for Hazard, and whose research focuses on injury epidemiology and injury prevention across the lifespan.