Cause and effect of road traffic accidents.

Over a ten year period, research in the Maxillofacial Unit of a District General Hospital into the mechanism by which facial injuries were sustained is reviewed. The work, based on the Unit in Chichester, Sussex, England, covered a large rural area with a resident population of approximately 600,000 which increased significantly during the summer holiday period, due to the influx of visitors. During the summer months, not only do the personnel in the area quadruple but so does the road traffic producing significant problems in the management of road traffic accidents.