OMG OW! Texting Your Way To The ER

Doctors Warn Of Dangerous Accidents For Oblivious Texters

(AP)  The warning came too late for Barack Obama's adviser: Don't walk and text at the same time.

Obama aide Valerie Jarrett fell off a Chicago curb several weeks ago while her thumbs were flying on her Blackberry.

"I didn't see the sidewalk and I twisted my ankle," Jarrett said. "It was a nice wake-up call for me to be a lot more careful in the future, because I clearly wasn't paying attention and I should have."

Jarrett got off easy and didn't need medical attention.

But in an alert issued this week, the American College of Emergency Physicians warns of the danger of more serious accidents involving oblivious texters. The ER doctors cite rising reports from doctors around the country of injuries involving text-messaging pedestrians, bicyclists, Rollerbladers, even motorists.

Most involve scrapes, cuts and sprains from texters who walked into lampposts or walls or tripped over curbs.

Still, ER doctors who responded to a recent informal query from the organization reported two deaths, both in California. A San Francisco woman was killed by a pickup truck earlier this year when she stepped off a curb while texting, and a Bakersfield man was killed last year by a car while crossing the street and texting.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has no national estimate on how common texting-related injuries are. But among the reports it has received: A 15-year-old girl fell off her horse while texting, suffering head and back injuries, and a 13-year-old girl suffered belly, leg and arm burns after texting her boyfriend while cooking noodles.

Giancarlo Yerkes texted his way across a busy Chicago street Tuesday and escaped unscathed. But the 30-year-old advertising employee admitted he once walked straight into a stop sign while texting and bumped his head.

Yerkes said that he texts while walking to maximize his time, and that the emergency doctors' warning probably won't stop him.

"There's a lot of things you shouldn't do - this is another one on my list," Yerkes said.

Dr. James Adams, chairman of emergency medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, said he has treated minor injuries in several texters.

"Common sense isn't always common," Adams said.

Sometimes even among doctors.

"I have to admit that I started a text while I was driving and then I said, `This is so stupid,' so I stopped," Adams said.

Dr. Patrick Walsh, an emergency physician in Bakersfield, Calif., said he is a texter, too, but tries to remind himself to do it intelligently.

"We think we're multitasking, but we're not," he said. "You're focusing on one task for a split second, then focusing on another one, and with something moving 40 miles an hour like a car, it just takes a couple of seconds to be hit."

Walsh, a native of Ireland, said that on a recent visit there he noticed an effective government TV ad campaign against texting and walking, aimed at teenagers.

The message echoes the new advice from U.S. emergency doctors.

"We don't want to sound like some stern schoolmistress, telling people don't text on your cell phone," Walsh said. "But when you're texting, look around," he said.

The ER group also says people should never text while driving, and should avoid talking on a cell phone or texting while doing other physical activities, including walking, biking, boating and Rollerblading.

[rf35]

The thing I like about other people texting is that I don''t have to hear them yelling into their phones. I don''t use a cell phone unless I really have to. The last time I used mine regularly was while I was staying in a hotel and would have been raped by the excess long distance charges to call home. Even then, I usually just called to ask my wife to call me back at the hotel. Anyway, point is that these people deserve what they get. Just one more way to help cull the herd.

[mandylou4u]

Missunderstanding there I guess, I meant to make the loud and obnoxious ghetto rap that is blarred at the car wash. Not my own radio. I am glad, I do have common sense, hehe.

[do_not_know]

Everyone in the government is trying to ban everything, instead of the idiots using them. & mandylou4u...ever thought of turning the volume all the way down, or taking out the cd in the car wash?

[mandylou4u]

I haven''t figured out how to get the tapes and cd''s to go off line while in the car wash, need future thought on that one, hehe. I do think it is offensive though to hear b.itch and ho comming from the car next to me when i''ve got a kid asking what that means in the back seat. Shouldn''t have to explain that, but I do also let the kids know that our family must have respect for others. They know about tolerance and they know how to ignore people like that very well.

GOP_forever, you are judging people on what they listen to. That my dear is a sin. Judge NOT less ye be judged

[mandylou4u]

Everyone has the right to listen to what they want. Those are the key words though, what they want. Everyone else may not want to hear what you are listening to in your car, hence the personal car radio.

[isotron-2009]

Added to the stupidity of texting while driving is the simple irony that most of the people making those calls don''t have anything interesting to talk about and probably are considered a pest by the person receiving the calls.

YO.......... blabbermouth, no one is interested in what you have to say anyway, so don''t risk everyones life doing it.

mute, not muste....Lord I need to proof read before hitting "publish"

mandylou4u, good point, but what if they are listening to a tape or CD? Why not just muste the speakers. My daughter purchased a car that had one of those stereos in it. The car was purchased by her mom and step father...I told them it was owned by s kid with a booming stereo and shouldn''t have purchased it. Oh well, "real" fathers, like the good ones (me) are only prooven right after the fact.

[mandylou4u]

I totally agree Mitch, sorry about my last comment too. I was ranting. I guess I gotta get it out somewhere, thanks! Something else they should use that scrambler thing on is the car washes. At one of the places I work, there is a car wash behind it and the boomin'' radios come on and it literaly rattles our walls. Very ridiculous. As soon as you pull the car into the bay, the radio and everything dies just like when you go into a tunnel, no signal. Would be a great idea...

Cars should be equipped with devices that scramble the cell phone, so it can%u2019t be used when it is in drive. As soon as a person put''s their car in drive, or first gear (on standard transmissions) it blocks all cell phones until it is stopped, or better yet, when the key is turned on. Unless of course the phone is put in a cradle, which makes the phone a hands free device. Taking away the ability to use any of the features the phone has, except for answering it. Something to that effect anyway.

[mandylou4u]

I gotta say, I love the "shut up and drive" bumber stickers. I was behind someone just yesterday and she was on the phone, driving, and she just gradually started slowing down until we were going about 50 mph in a 65 mph zone. The cell phone has really made people retarded. Some people act like they can''t make a move without their phone. I''m not just b.itchin'' either, I don''t own a cell phone and never will. I like talking to people, not machines. People have already lost enough touch with reality. I work at a store that deals with a lot of cash and we actually have to put up signs for the idiots that can''t seem to put their phone down to do a 3000.00 dollar transaction. Many times I have been told I shorted someone when in fact, they were on their phone not paying attention when I gave them their change. That''s what s.ucks the most, people don''t want to talk to you anymore, they want to yack into a machine.

[observer2020]

mandylou4u: Well said!

[mswolfestock]

These are the same idiots who are yakking on their phones while they attempt to drive . . . . . .

[mandylou4u]

I think texting is dumb all together. Why not talk to someone on the phone. If you want to type, go to the computer and do what we are doing. Texting is just another way to act like you are the only person that exists. It''s just another way to turn people off to the real world outside their phone. I wish cell phones didn''t exist all together. I remember life before the cell phone and I enjoyed it!

[blackyowe]

The trouble is these dopes take other people with them when the wreck their cars and stuff. They cause others to try to rescue them from what ever dumb thing they do because they can''t focus on reality and make others risk their lives.

[dvillegas43-2009]

Look at it this way, stupid people don''t live long enough to give reproduce more stupid people. This is nature''s (or technology''s) way of thinning the herd.

[blackyowe]

I remember Jeff, I live in Western, NY not that far away from where it happened. Little kids always have their heads down with those hand held games. What a stupid idiotic place this world has become. It''s not like other things have not distracted people like car radios and that but this culture of head down brain out to lunch is really pathetic way to live. You miss all the best things besides endangering yourself and others.

[blackyowe]

Just shows you how stupid society has become. Those who do this kind of thing are bucking for a Darwin Award! I have zero sympathy.

[blackyowe]

Just shows you how stupid society has become. Those who do this kind of thing are bucking for a Darwin Award! I have zero sympathy.