The UAB Department of Surgery’s Division of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery team highlights the dangers of red-light running and urges caution behind the wheel.
The first week of August marks National Stop on Red Week, a campaign by the National Coalition for Safer Roads. The campaign’s purpose is to raise awareness about the devastating consequences of running red lights, a choice that endangers not only drivers but also pedestrians, cyclists, and other motorists.
At UAB, the trauma team sees firsthand the tragic outcomes of red-light violations. According to Shannon Carroll, M.D., an associate professor of Surgery and Principal Investigator of the Crash Injury Research and Engineering Network (CIREN) at UAB, these types of crashes are both common and largely preventable.
“Red-light running is one of the most preventable causes of serious injury and death,” said Carroll. “Many of the high-impact collisions we study through CIREN involve intersection crashes that could have been avoided if a driver had simply stopped.”
Since 2010, UAB has served as a designated CIREN medical center, one of only a few in the nation supported by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). CIREN brings together trauma surgeons, crash investigators, engineers, and epidemiologists to study the biomechanics of injury in severe motor vehicle crashes.
Alabama consistently ranks among the top states for motor vehicle death rates, and intersection crashes remain a leading contributor. CIREN’s mission is to reduce deaths, disabilities, and the human and economic costs of crashes through better prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation. As part of the program, patients severely injured in crashes consent to let the team reconstruct their collisions. A crash investigator documents vehicle deformation, while nurses and physicians map the injuries, and engineers match each injury to a specific vehicle interior feature. This unique linkage of crash dynamics and clinical data helps uncover injury patterns that may not be apparent through routine trauma registries or crash reports alone.
UAB’s trauma teams are also seeing worrying trends and according to a recent study led by Russell Griffin, Ph.D., an associate professor of Epidemiology in the UAB Department of Public Health depicting fatal crashes in Alabama which rose by 26% from 2020 to 2022, despite fewer miles traveled and fewer injuries per crash.
Griffin’s research highlights the urgency of outreach and education, particularly as intersection-related crashes remain a top cause of trauma admissions at UAB Hospital.
As the only American College of Surgeons-verified Level I trauma center in Alabama, UAB Hospital sees the consequences of red-light running up close. Through education, and continued public engagement, the trauma team hopes to prevent injuries before they happen.
“Stop on Red Week is more than a slogan,” said Carroll. “It’s a chance to remind drivers that a moment of caution can mean the difference between getting home safely, or not at all.”