WISQARS™ Fatal Injury Mapping Help Menu
2.1 Injury Type Options
The options in this section allow you to specify the type of injury death (all injuries or traumatic brain injury only), the intent (manner) of injury, and the mechanism (cause) of injury.
All Injury / Traumatic Brain Injury
You can request a map that includes deaths associated with all injuries or deaths associated with traumatic brain injury (TBI) only:
- All injury (the default) includes all types of physical injuries (e.g., internal injuries and external injuries) and poisonings when the underlying cause of death was an external injury.
- Traumatic brain injury (TBI) only includes only deaths due to external injury also accompanied by a diagnosis of concussion or internal head injury. Because TBI is the leading type of injury resulting in death, it is provided as a separate reporting category. The International Classification of Disease, 10th Revision2 (ICD-10) diagnosis codes used to identify such cases are: S01.0–S01.9, S02.0, S02.1, S02.3, S02.7–S02.9, S04.0, S06.0–S06.9, S07.0, S07.1, S07.8, S07.9, S09.7–S09.9, T90.1, T90.2, T90.4, T90.5, T90.8, and T90.9.
Intent of Injury
The intent (manner) of injury indicates whether an injury death was unintentional, or due to an act deliberately carried out by oneself or another person(s) with the goal of injuring or killing, or was such that the intent could not be determined. You can request a map including injuries for the following intent categories:
- All intents (the default) includes all injury-related deaths regardless of the intent.
- Unintentional refers to deaths due to injuries not inflicted by deliberate means and includes injuries and poisonings described as “accidents,” regardless of whether the injury was inflicted by oneself or by another person.
- Homicide refers to deaths due to injuries inflicted by any means by another person with the intent to injure or kill. It excludes injury-related deaths resulting from legal intervention and operations of war. Justifiable homicide is not separately identified in WISQARS Fatal Injury Mapping.
- Legal intervention refers to deaths due to injuries inflicted by police or other law enforcement agents, including military on duty, in the course of arresting or attempting to arrest lawbreakers, suppressing disturbances, maintaining order, and performing other legal actions. It excludes injuries caused by civil insurrections.
- Suicide refers to intentionally self-inflicted injuries that resulted in death.
- Undetermined refers to deaths due to injuries for which the intent could not be determined.
Notes: The intent category violence-related ccombines the separate categories homicide, legal intervention, and suicide. The intent category homicide and legal intervention combines the separate categories homicide and legal intervention. Injury deaths among military personnel or civilians due to war or civil insurrection, occurring both during the time of war or insurrection and after cessation of hostilities, are classified under “operations of war.” The total number of deaths in this category (ICD-10 external cause codes Y36.0–Y36.9 and Y89.1) is generally small (an average of 17 such deaths per year were recorded in the data for 2008 – 2014). These operations of war deaths are included in the all intents category but cannot be reported separately using WISQARS Fatal Injury Mapping.
Mechanism of Injury
The mechanism (cause) of injury is the way in which the person sustained the injury, how the person was injured, or the process by which the injury occurred.
The intent (manner) of injury that you select, in combination with the mechanism (cause) of injury that you select, will allow you to narrow your query. Not all combinations are valid (legitimate or applicable). Click on the link immediately below to see a table showing the available intent and mechanism combinations. An X in a table cell indicates a valid combination. For instance, the intent “Suicide” and the mechanism “Drowning” are a valid combination, so an X appears in the corresponding cell. The intent “Legal Intervention” and the mechanism “Drowning” are not a valid combination, so the corresponding cell is empty.
Valid Intent and Mechanism Combinations (1999 and Later Data)
Most of the combinations in the table above are from the External Cause of Injury Mortality Matrix for ICD-10pdf icon 
(PDF 108KB) and are defined according to ICD-10 codes.2 The definitions of ICD-10 codes are available from the World Health Organizationexternal icon website.
A few entries in the table above are not directly defined in the External Cause of Injury Mortality Matrix for ICD-10. The ICD-10 code definitions for such entries are defined in the supplemental table below:
| Mechanism (Cause) of Injury | ICD-10 Codes |
|---|---|
| Residential Fire / Flame† | X00–X09 and Place of Injury = Home |
| Non-Firearm (Homicide and Legal Intervention) | X85–X92, X96–Y09, Y35(.1–.7), Y87.1, Y89.0 |
| Non-Firearm (Homicide) | X85–X92, X96–Y09, Y87.1, *U01(.0–.3, .5–.9), *U02 |
| Non-Firearm (Suicide) | X60–X71, X75–X84, Y87.0, *U03 |
| Motor Vehicle, Overall | V02–V04, V09(.0, .2), V12–V14, V19(.0–.2, .4–.6), V20–V79, V80(.3–.5), V81–V82(.0, .1), V83–V86, V87–V88(.0–.8), V89(.0, .2) |
| Pedal cyclist (MVT & Other) | V10–V18, V19(.0–.6, .8, .9) |
| Pedestrian (MVT & Other) | V01, V02–V04(.0, .1, .9), V05, V06, V09(.0–.3, .9) |
| All Injury and Adverse Effects | V01–Y36, Y40–Y89, *U01–*U03 |
| All Injury (Unintentional) and Adverse Effects | V01–X59, Y40–Y86, Y88 |
†The percentage of deaths attributed to exposure to smoke/fire/flame (X00-X09) but with no recorded place of injury was approximately 7% for the data covering the years 2008 – 2014. Please keep this in mind when interpreting your results.
Note: WISQARS Fatal Injury Mapping is designed to recognize terrorism as a specific mechanism (cause) of injury, with intent classified as either homicide or suicide. Details on the ICD-10 codes used to indicate terrorism are available from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) website. The terrorism attacks that occurred in New York City, Pennsylvania, and Virginia in September 2001 resulted in the loss of life for 2,926 U.S. residents in 2001 and one U.S. resident in 2002. Since 2002, the ICD-10 terrorism codes have appeared in the data used by WISQARS Fatal Injury Mapping only for the year 2013, representing three homicide deaths associated with the Boston Marathon bombing.
WISQARSTM Fatal Injury Mapping
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