Doctors at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children say they are seeing a growing number of children seriously injured in e-scooter crashes, with some suffering traumatic injuries and complex fractures.
“It’s been exponential really,” Dr. Suzanne Beno, a pediatric emergency physician and co-medical director of SickKids’ trauma program, said about the influx of children with injuries.
Bono said e-scooter injuries reached a “tipping point” in 2024 and have doubled every year since.
“This year, we’re seeing several, three to five, e-scooter injuries a week at SickKids.”
While some children arrive with minor injuries, Beno said more are being rushed to the hospital’s trauma bay after high-speed crashes or collisions with vehicles.
“We see a lot of patients with head injuries, thoracic injuries, some spine injuries, some abdominal injuries and a lot of fractures,” Beno said.
“A lot of these injuries are requiring operative care, intensive care or prolonged rehabilitation.”
Severe injuries becoming routine
For Dr. Carolyn Rutten, a pediatric emergency radiologist at SickKids, reviewing scans from e-scooter crashes has become a routine part of overnight shifts.
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“At this point in the summer, they’re almost daily,” Rutten said.
She said the fractures she sees are often far more severe than those from typical playground accidents.
“With e-scooters we see more severe fractures,” Rutten said. “The fractures are often more severely displaced than they would be for playground trauma.”
The hospital is also seeing an increasing number of traumatic brain injuries.
Rutten said children can suffer skull fractures and bleeding inside the brain that can create dangerous pressure, sometimes requiring surgeons to remove part of the skull to save the child’s life.
When asked whether children should be riding e-scooters, she replied, “I really wish they weren’t.”
Long recoveries
Dr. Joshua Ramjist, a pediatric general surgeon and trauma medical co-director, said many families don’t realize how serious the injuries can be.
“They function like any other motorized vehicle and the injury patterns we see as a result of them resemble those of high-speed motor vehicle accidents,” he said.
Ramjist said many of the injuries involve multiple parts of the body, including the head, chest and abdomen, often leaving children with long recoveries.
“It’s more than just broken bones,” he said. “It’s multi-organ injuries.”
Some children require lengthy surgeries, repeated operations, time in intensive care and weeks or even months of rehabilitation before they can return to normal activities, Ramjist said.
As e-scooters become more common, Beno said prevention needs to go beyond simply encouraging children to wear helmets.
She said stronger public education, clearer regulations, better enforcement and safer infrastructure are all needed to reduce the number of serious injuries.
Beno also said many parents don’t realize that privately owned e-scooters can travel much faster than rental models.
Rutten said SickKids researchers have documented crashes involving speeds of up to 50 kilometres per hour.
“The higher the speed, the higher impact the trauma is and the more severe it is on the body,” Rutten said.
Beno said children under 16 should not be riding e-scooters because many lack the physical and cognitive skills needed to safely operate them.
“It’s tragic because it’s so preventable,” she said.
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