crash reconstruction IS important for physicians who treat these injuries but to do that, to understand that science, you have to adopt the foundational concepts involved in that science - delta-V, acceleration, methodologies for human subject testing - as part of the science. You don't have to agree with them if you can articulate a reason not to, but you cannot subjugate objective physical fact and a repeatable test to sheer faith, belief and human perception. While I agree that a "physician of any type must be familiar with the MOI," an understanding of severity from an OBJECTIVE perspective must necessarily be part of that component or there is not real UNDERSTANDING.

Contrary to your assertion, my "approach" would NOT leave us without a discussion. It would bring us back to an objective discussion of crash severity from something quantifiable - like delta-V - and then integrate the medical side of the debate for an understanding of how the body reacts to collisions...which is precisely what real live biomechanics do and most in the medical profession do NOT do. It might NOT be a good idea for medical practitioners to "dabble" a bit in reconstruction. We might call them advocates or something.

Greg, the way I see it, we're never going to agree on what I've pointed out are the obvious flaws of the epidemiological studies you hang your hat on. Read into them what you will but you cannot demonstrate where they have an OBJECTIVE basis and I contend that they are a misapplication of the science. We're in agreement - as I've said time and again - that people can be hurt in crashes - even those I've defined as "low delta-V" crashes in the right circumstances. We're not in agreement that a patient's perception is inherently flawed, but then again, it must be better than yours as a prepared observer because we're also not in agreement that your perception of what went on in that crash test is flawed even though it runs counter to the video and photo record not to mention my representations of how I did it which are supported by the video, photo and accelerometer record.

The way I see it, we're not going to agree here on the basics so we have no common frame of reference and, while we don't have to agree, we do have to honor the intent of the TARO site which is about crash reconstruction not the statistical analysis of subjective and unverifiable beliefs so, for my part, I'm going to take the tip from Jim and beg off, leaving the bandwidth here for RECONSTRUCTION topics. No doubt we'll connect again at a conference somewhere and be better able to debate this over an adult beverage but this doesn't seem to be going anywhere.

Rusty Haight
rustyhaight@worldnet.att.net

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