Unusually high number of injuries in Oslo so far this year

Slippery roadsSlippery roads.Photo: NTB scanpix / Larsen, Håkon Mosvold

The Emergency Room in Oslo, so far this year, has received around 48 pedestrians with fall injuries everyday due to slippery roads. Thirty-eight per cent of them have obvious fractures.

 

Large fluctuations in temperature in recent weeks have led to extremely slippery roads in the capital and in most parts of the country.

“It has been a hectic start in 2018. We have treated around 1,800 pedestrians who have slid and fallen while walking, and we are only half-way though February, so this is a high number,” says chief executive Knut Melhuus at Oslo damages to NRK.

Melhuus says the most common fracture injuries were wrist fractures as a result of people trying to catch themselves as they fall.

Akershus University Hospital also noted a marked increase, especially in hip fractures. Orthopedic Clinic Director, Inge Skråmm, says there have performed around 94 operations on hip fractures so far in January this year.

“It is very high,” he says. The average number of operations in a month is 60.

In Oslo, roughly 22,000 tonnes of gravel have been sprinkled on slippery roads so far this season. It is more than any other winter the municipality has ever accounted for.

Head of Division for Road Administration Section Leader, Joakim Hjertum, says the agency could prioritize plowing through snow faster and more often, adding:

“We have contracts that are designed for normal winter, not these big, heavy snow cases, which can come more and more.”

 

© NTB Scanpix / Norway Today