Close to zero preventable in-hospital deaths in pediatric trauma patients – An observational study from a major Scandinavian trauma center

•This mature and multidisciplinary trauma service was associated with a very low in-hospital mortality in severely injured children.•Deaths were shown to be almost exclusively non-preventable.•The rate of futile care and extensive emergency surgical procedures significantly decreased during the study period; there were no ED thoracotomies in non-survivors after 2013. In line with international trends, initial treatment of trauma patients has changed substantially over the last two decades. Although trauma is the leading cause of death and disability in children globally, in-hospital pediatric trauma related mortality is expected to be low in a mature trauma system. To evaluate the performance of a major Scandinavian trauma center we assessed treatment strategies and outcomes in all pediatric trauma patients over a 16-year period. A retrospective cohort study of all trauma patients under the age of 18 years admitted to a single institution from 1st of January 2003 to 31st of December 2018. Outcomes for two time periods were compared, 2003–2009 (Period 1; P1) and 2010–2018 (Period 2; P2). Deaths were further analyzed for preventability by the institutional trauma Mortality and Morbidity panel. The study cohort consisted of 3939 patients. A total of 57 patients died resulting in a crude mortality of 1.4%, nearly one quarter of the study cohort (22.6%) was severely injured (Injury Severity Score > 15) and mortality in this group decreased from 9.7% in P1 to 4.1% in P2 (p