An observational study in Drowning, Drowning; Anoxia and Drowning, Near, sponsored by Prehospital Center, Region Zealand. Active, not recruiting at 1 site in Denmark. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2025-08-27.
Sponsored by Prehospital Center, Region Zealand · Observational
According to WHO's rules, any death certificate must state the underlying cause of death and contributory causes of death may also be stated.
Differentiating between primary and secondary drowning is difficult, as information preceding the drowning incident is rarely available. Yet, knowing the most frequent causes of secondary drowning may provide useful information to healthcare professionals working in prehospital Emergency Medical Services, as this may affect prehospital treatment.
The annual death statistics are based solely on the underlying cause of death, that is the disease or condition which started the process that led to death. The conditions that directly caused the death are also to be stated by the physician on the death certificate and may be included in the statistics. In research projects, data on those contributory causes of death may be drawn from the register. It is now the medical doctor who has verified the death and issued the death certificate indicating the underlying and contributory causes of death, who also classifies these causes in accordance with ICD-10 and fills in the coded data on the electronic death certificate. The Danish Register of Causes of Death is, thus, updated without central validation of the classification and relies entirely on the coding done by individual physicians.
This study aims to characterise fatal drowning incidents as primary or secondary drownings and report the frequencies of secondary drowning causes.
21 studies on the registry are indexed under Drowning; 6 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 700 is below the median of 1,099 across 14 observational studies indexed under Drowning.
Browse Drowning studies →Prehospital Center, Region Zealand is the lead sponsor of 16 studies on the registry; 4 are open to participants now.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
The Danish Prehospital Drowning Data reports prehospital data on patients with fatal and non-fatal drowning treated by the Emergency Medical Services in Denmark since 2016. Drowning incidents are identified from the Danish Prehospital Electronic Medical Record using the Danish Drowning Formula and extensive manual validation. Data is extracted following the revised USFD. The patients' unique civil registration number enable linkage with the Civil Personal Register to obtain data on 30-day survival and differentiate between fatal and non-fatal drowning incidents
Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
Exclusion Criteria:
These patients are registered in the Danish Register of Causes of Death, with drowning as an underlying cause of death in the death certificate.
Other: Drowning
These patients are registered in the Danish Register of Causes of Death, with drowning as a contributory cause of death or drowning not registered in the death certificate.
Other: Drowning
Drowning is defined as the process of experiencing respiratory impairment from submersion or immersion in liquid.
Autopsy rate
Calculated as the number of autopsy reports divided by the number of fatal drowning incidents registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data.
Time frame: Data is extracted on patients registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data from 2016-2023.
Primary fatal drowning rate
Calculated as the number of autopsy reports stating drowning as the underlying cause of death divided by the number of fatal drowning incidents registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data.
Time frame: Data is extracted on patients registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data from 2016-2023.
Secondary fatal drowning rate
Calculated as the number of autopsy reports stating drowning as the contributory cause of death OR not stating drowning as a contributory cause of death divided by the number of fatal drowning incidents registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data.
Time frame: Data is extracted on patients registered in the Danish Prehospital Drowning Data from 2016-2023.
Plan to share: No — The data are available upon reasonable request from researchers after application to the corresponding author, provided the necessary approvals are obtained from the relevant authorities.
Started Jan 2016 (actual). Primary completion is estimated for Dec 2025, 119 months after the start.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
This study is active, not recruiting, as verified in Aug 2025. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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Prehospital Center, Region Zealand