Bicycle Accidents and Personal Injuries on the Rise Across Florida

With the growing number of people who are turning to cycling for commuting to work and for recreation and exercise, Fort Lauderdale personal injury lawyer Joseph Lipsky expected that the number of bicycle accident and injuries would also increase. Now, a new study by The Journal of the American Medical Association, based upon the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, which evaluates data from emergency rooms across the United States, confirms that the number of bicycle riding related accidents and injures increased over the last seven years.

Of particular concern is the great number of injuries involving bike users over the age of forty-five. Those riders saw an almost 100 percent increase in their number of injuries requiring a visit to an emergency room. The number of injured riders outpaced the increase in total bicycle use, which rose just over 20 percent since 2001. Sadly, more than 700 people lose their lives in bike accidents annually across America.

As expected, the leading causes of bike accidents and personal injuries were collisions with cars, falling down and riding on roads which were not in good condition. Having represented dozens of bicyclists injured due to potholes and misaligned roads, Florida personal injury attorney Joseph Lipsky, knows too well the dangers caused by communities and cities not properly maintaining the roads they know cyclists use.

The study correlated the ratio of injures with the age of those injured and found that the older the rider, the more likely they were to suffer more serious injuries in a bike accident. The study found the overall number of people injured in bicycle related accident increased from 96 to 123 out of 100,000. This increase was actually less than the number of people who required hospital admissions from such accidents; that ratio rose from 5 to 11 individuals per 100,000.

The study also found that the most common personal injuries were those to the head and torso of riders. Given this data, Miami personal injury attorney Joseph Lipsky reminds his fellow cyclists to use common sense by wearing safety equipment, including helmets. Also, he urges riders to remember that Florida’s laws apply to bike riders too.