Injuries related to marine animals (all ages)

Marine animals include shark, jellyfish, octopus, fish, and stingray.

Frequency: There were 545 hospital-treated marine animal injury cases over the 5-year period 2003-2007 (150 hospital admissions and 395 emergency department (ED) presentations (excluding admissions), recorded in the Victorian Emergency Minimum Dataset (VEMD) and the Victorian Admitted Episodes Dataset (VAED). Table 1 shows the annual frequency of ED presentations and hospital admissions by year. The frequency of injuries varied over the 5-year period with highest proportion of presentations and admissions reported in 2007, 29% and 24% of cases respectively (Table 1).

Table 1: Marine animal-related injury ED presentations and hospital admissions by year

Age: ED presentations peaked in persons aged 30-34 years (13%), whereas hospitalisations peaked in persons aged 40-44 years (15%).

Figure 1: Marine animal-related injury presentations by age groups and level of severity

Gender: Males were over represented, accounting for 75% of ED presentations and 83% of hospital admissions.

Cause: Among ED presentations, most marine animal-related injuries involved fish (31%), mostly due to penetration by spikes, spines or barbs (60% of all fish-related cases), followed by stingrays (25%), mostly stings (33% of all stingray cases) and jellyfish stings (22%). Among hospital admissions, 37% of all injuries were coded to other specified marine animal, 21% of admissions were caused by contact with stingrays, and 15% were contact with other specified venomous marine animals and plants.

Nature of injury: Among ED presentations, the most common injury types were bites (43%), followed by foreign bodies (23%) and open wounds (19%). In contrast, open wounds accounted for 49% of all hospital admissions, followed by poisonings (21%) and superficial injuries (14%).

Body region: For ED presentations, the lower extremity (34%) and the upper extremity (29%) were both commonly injured. The pattern was similar among hospital admissions except in the reverse order: upper extremity (36%) and lower extremity (32%).

Activity: Among ED presentations, the most commonly recorded activity undertaken when injured was leisure, accounting for 74% of cases. Among hospital admissions, 32% of injuries were sustained while engaged in sporting activities and 9% during paid work. In 38% of cases, the activity was not specified.

Location: In 47% of ED presentations, the injury occurred at a place of recreation. Among hospital admissions, 58% of injuries were coded to 'other specified' locations.

Discharge status: Among the 150 admissions, 58% stayed in hospital for less than 2 days, 33% were hospitalised for 2-7 days and 8% stayed in hospital for more than 8 days. At the end of their stay, 96% were discharged home.

Prevention: Fishers should wear appropriate protective apparel such as gloves, footwear and clothing when handling or interacting with marine animals, including taking care when landing, handling, cleaning and preparing fish for cooking to avoid spine, spike, and barb injury. Protective footwear should be worn when walking through marine shallows and along beaches and protective apparel when swimming in periods of high jellyfish activity. Authorities should monitor jellyfish presence and notify the public when the risk of jellyfish sting is unacceptable high.

Further information: For further information regarding marine animal-related injury, see Hazard editions 35.

Data source: The Victorian Admitted Episodes Dataset (VAED): January 2002 to December 2007. The Victorian Emergency Minimum Dataset (VEMD): January 2002 to December 2007.

Search Strategy: Cases in the VAED data were selected using code “W56.0 Contact with shark”, “W56.8 Contact with other specified marine animal”, “W56.9 Contact with unspecified marine animal”, “X26.0 Contact with jellyfish”, “X26.00 Contact with box jellyfish”, “X26.01 Contact with Irukandji jellyfish”, “X26.02 Contact with Portuguese Man-o-war and bluebottle”, “X26.08 Contact with other specified jellyfish”, “X26.09 Contact with unspecified jellyfish”, “X26.10 Contact with stone fish”, “X26.18 Contact with other specified stinging fish”, “X26.2 Contact with venomous octopus”, “X26.3 Contact with stingray”, “X26.8 Contact with other specified venomous marine animals and plants”, “X26.9 Contact with unspecified venomous marine animals and plants”. Cases in the VEMD were selected by searching those cases with the same text terms as the VAED codes.