Objective: Animal related injuries are not well defined in Turkey as all over the world. Traumas due to cattle cause important health risks for the people living in rural areas. These traumas may cause blunt and penetrating injuries in various parts of the body due to high energy transfer.

Materials and Methods: Data from the patients taken to the Firat University Faculty of Medicine Departrment of Emergency Medicine (ED) due to animal related injuries between January 2002 and August 2004 were recorded to the patient forms and analysed by SPSS 10.0 program. Values were expressed as percentage and standart deviation.

Results: During that time period 32 patients were admitted to the ED due to animal related injuries. Bites were not included to the study. Nineteen of patients (59.4%) came due to animal related injuries. Mean age of the patients was 32.26±30.6 years. Thirteen of the patients (68.4%) were male. Injuries were most frequently seen in the first decade (36.8%). It was determined that patients had been admitted to ED quite late (mean admission time 238.15_74.2 minutes). Injuries were usually caused by horses (57.9%). The most frequent mechanism was kicking (68.4%), mostly affected site of the body was the head (73.7%). Multiple trauma was detected in six (31.6%) of the patients. Six patients (31.6%) were discharged, 11 (57.9%) were admitted to the hospital. Mean staying time in ED was 165.52±114.5 minutes. One in ED, totally three patients (15.8%) died; one due to horse kicking, two cow kicking. Most of the patients (21.1%) were admitted to neurosurgery department and mean duration of admission was 12.09±9.4 days. Nine (47.4%) of the patients were operated.

Conclusion: It is important in Turkey to prevent animal related injuries. They are met very rarely in ED but cause high mortality. We think that there is not enough epidemiological data about animal related injuries.