Denver to Host Save Your Neck Day; a Public Awarenss Event Designed to Educate Consumers about Whiplash

DENVER--Oct. 6, 2003--Spinal Injury Foundation to Sponsor Event that Will Teach Consumers How to Properly Use Car Headrests to Prevent Whiplash and Related Neck Injuries in Automobile Accidents

WHO:    The Spinal Injury Foundation, a non-profit organization
        dedicated to advocacy for those with chronic spinal injuries.

WHAT:   The 2003 Save Your Neck Public Awareness Event: The Save
        Your Neck Program is an international not-for-profit event
        designed to educate drivers and passengers of motor vehicles
        about the importance of correctly positioning car head
        restraints to prevent serious neck injuries in rear-end
        collisions.

        Consumers can visit a safety checkpoint and have their
        headrests and neck restraints adjusted by medical
        professionals.

        Hundreds of thousands of Americans today suffer from life
        changing neck injuries that may have otherwise been prevented.
        An automobile headrest and seat back are safety systems that
        can prevent injuries in a rear-end collision. The Save Your
        Neck Program will show drivers that taking a few minutes to
        adjust their headrests could prevent a lifetime of disability.
        Denver's event comes on the heels of other similar Save Your
        Neck initiatives across the globe.

WHEN:   Saturday, October 11, 2003
        10:00 AM - 1:00 PM

WHERE:  Sill-Terhar Volvo Dealership
        150 Alter Street (I-36 and Wadsworth Blvd.)
        Broomfield, CO
        303-469-1801

WHY:    Serious neck and whiplash injuries affect the lives of more 
        than one million people in the U.S. every year. Experts 
        estimate that between 25 - 40 percent of these people will 
        have chronic symptoms. Every 2.5 seconds, a motor vehicle 
        accident occurs across the US, totaling more than 12 million 
        reported in the US each year. With incidence levels of 
        whiplash increasing considerably, more than $29 billion is now
        being spent annually on healthcare and/or litigation related 
        to whiplash injuries.

Due to the increase in incidences of whiplash and neck injuries, many automobile manufacturers have redesigned their seat/head restraints, which help to reduce forces between the head, neck and torso during an accident. 2002 studies conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety revealed a significant decrease in neck injury claims rates since the introduction of redesigned seats and head restraints in some new automobile models versus older designs. In Volvo S70's alone, neck injury claims have dropped 49 percent in vehicles with the new seat/head restraint design. Other manufacturers are slowly making similar changes. In fact, from the thousands of new car models introduced per year, only nine have made the switch. Most people do not concern themselves with a vehicle's head restraint system when making an automobile purchase, yet the likelihood of them experiencing a life-changing neck injury in an accident is nearly three times that of a fatal accident or one requiring extensive hospitalization, according to studies performed by the Department of Transportation.