Bicycle-Related Injuries of the Upper Extremity

Background: In recent years, the increasing popularity of cycling for commuting and leisure has led to acorresponding increase in bicycle-related injuries. However, there is a lack of extensive analysis of bicycle-relatedinjuries to the upper limb in the literature.Methods: A retrospective review of all patients with conventional bicycle-related injuries of the upper limb wasperformed. Data on demographics, mechanisms of injury, region of injury, fracture type, management type, andlength of hospital stay were extracted and analyzed.Results: A total of 177 of 733(24%) patients with bicycle-related upper limb injuries were identified. The most commonmechanism of injury was a collision with another vehicle (60%). Frequently affected regions were the shoulder(48%), hand (19%), and wrist (19%). Eighty-eight (50%) patients sustained bony injuries, while the remainder (50%)had isolated soft tissue injuries. Fifty-three (30%) patients required a mean of 3.9 days of hospitalization, whereas13 (25%) patients required high dependency or intensive care unit treatment. Surgical interventions were requiredin 47 (27%) patients.Conclusion: Bicycle-related injuries to the upper limb are common and result in significant morbidity. The mostcommon regions affected are the shoulder, wrist, and hand. Most of the injuries were caused by collisions with othervehicles. A third of affected patients required hospitalization, and a quar ter required surgical intervention.Level of evidence: III