North County Injury Blog

In the last year, San Diego has had a series of accidents involving elderly drivers, several of them fatal. (See an earlier blog entry). It has happened again, yesterday in the parking lot of the Bay Ho Costco on Morena Boulevard. According to reports, an 86-year-old driver was pulling his Cadillac Coupe de Ville out…

One of the few upsides to an ailing economy is the improvement in traffic accident deaths. The number of people who died in a car accident in 2009 was 33,963, which is almost 9 percent lower than the previous year. Ray LaHood, the Transportation Secretary, was circumspect about the news. “I have mixed feelings,” he…

SANDAG officials will tell you that Highway 67 is not the most dangerous highway in San Diego County. In fact, the windy, mostly two-laned road from Lakeside to Ramona ranks 17th in priority of roads in the county in need of improvements according to SANDAG. Tell that to the numerous individuals who have been seriously…

The Orange County District Attorney’s office has filed a civil lawsuit against Toyota Motor Company for “knowingly selling hundreds of thousands of vehicles” with defects to the acceleration system. Toyota’s U.S. sales headquarters is in Torrance, but it has not yet received the complaint. As a result of its well known accelerator problems, which infamously…

A volunteer for the Los Angeles Triathlon received a settlement of $7 million from the City of Los Angeles after being rendered a paraplegic in an accident related to the race. Steve Albala was riding on his motorcycle and helping officiate the bicycle leg of the triathlon when he was struck by a car at…

The number of local Marines killed while riding motorcycles decreased for the first time in three years. The decrease is the result of new safety classes made available to Marines at Camp Pendleton and Miramar Air Force Base. In particular, the Marines are targeting those who ride sport bikes which are lightweight, powerful and popular…

It is being reported that a Fallbrook school bus struck a man in the 1700 block of Reche Road killing him. According to news reports, the man was “drawing on the road with chalk” when the bus hit him and knocked him into a Ford Explorer. The accident occurred in front of Potter Junior High…

In 1996, Koua Fong Lee killed three people when, on his way home from church with his wife and daughter in the car, his Toyota Camry plowed into the rear of an Oldsmobile. At the time, Lee told police and prosecutors, and later a jury, he tried to stop his care but he couldn’t. The…

A new device that tracks and locates retained objects (surgical items left inside a patient after an operation) is getting attention. The RF Surgical Detection System uses a wand to scan the surgical area to find any tagged items that might have been left inside the patient. Tags are small seed-like items that are embedded…

The New York Times has obtained a government report that concludes that the drug Avandia [aka Rosiglitazone], prescribed for diabetes, causes heart attacks and heart failure and should be removed from the market. According to the report, if every diabetic currently on Avandia were instead given Actos, an alternative drug, about 500 heart attacks and…