New health research shows children in New Zealand are dying from serious trauma injuries at twice the rate of children in Victoria, Australia.
The research resulted from a collaboration between trauma networks in New Zealand and Australia and examined the cases of 1354 children seriously injured in a five-year period between mid-2017 and mid-2022.
The study group comprised 754 patients from Aotearoa and 600 from Victoria who were all aged under 16 at the time they were injured.
The research focused on blunt and penetrating injuries usually caused by car, motorbike or bicycle accidents and serious burns.
The findings were presented to more than 300 doctors and trauma specialists at the National Trauma Symposium at Te Papa. They were also exclusively released to 1News.
One of the lead researchers, Dr Warwick Teague from the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne, travelled to Aotearoa to present the research.
"So quite specifically, children in New Zealand are twice as likely to die from severe injury when compared with children in Victoria, Australia," Teague said. "Now it's a striking finding and we've made sure we've got good statistics."
Teague said there are many similarities between New Zealand and Australia when it comes to the number and types of serious injuries suffered by children. One of the key differences is where children, once stabilised, are treated for most of their recovery, he said.
In Victoria, those under 16 with serious trauma injuries are sent to the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne.
In New Zealand, children may be sent to a range of hospitals with varying levels of paediatric care.
Teague said this may be a significant factor in New Zealand's lower survival rates.
"The best suggestion that the data brings to us is that children who are brought to a centre which looks after children, whether that's children alone or adults and children, that they have the right expertise," he said.
"Children who are brought to a tertiary centre with paediatric expertise are almost two thirds less likely to die than children who are taken either to not a tertiary centre or to an adult hospital and we feel that that is the driver of difference between New Zealand and Victoria."
Overall, the research found nine children's lives would have been saved if they had all gone to hospitals offering specialist paediatric care.
The mood among health professionals was sombre in the wake of the presentation.
"We would see every preventable death or potentially preventable death as a tragedy," Te Whatu Ora's Dr James Moore said.
"That's why we've got to adjust our systems to try and provide the best care and get people to the places they need to be."
Te Whatu Ora is currently working to establish new clinical networks to improve patient outcomes, including for trauma patients.
Christchurch emergency specialist Dr Dominic Fleischer said it's disappointing that a child in New Zealand has twice the chance of dying when injured compared to a child in Victoria.
"Victoria has always been an aspiration for the New Zealand trauma service," he said. "They're an established trauma service, recognised the world over as being the leaders of trauma. So New Zealand has always aimed to get there and in some parts we probably are getting closer, but clearly when it deals with the issues of children, we're not quite there."
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