Is the Injury Severity Score Calculator free to use?

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Are my inputs stored or sent to a server?

No. Calculations run locally in your browser. We do not collect the numbers you enter or the results shown.

Can I use the Injury Severity Score Calculator for professional decisions?

This tool is for education and quick estimates. For medical, legal, tax, or financial decisions, verify results with a qualified professional.

Where can I find related calculators?

Browse more Health tools on Try To Calculator at /health, or use the related calculators section on this page.

Injury Severity Score Calculator

Q: What does the Injury Severity Score Calculator do?

The Injury Severity Score calculator helps to assess trauma severity, especially in patients with multiple injuries. Use the calculator above for instant results in your browser.

Last updated: June 18, 20246 people find this calculator helpful

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The Injury Severity Score calculator helps to assess trauma severity, especially in patients with multiple injuries. It helps to define the term "major trauma" and ISS correlates with mortality, morbidity, and hospitalization time after injury. Read the text below to find out more about the Injury Severity Score calculation (ISS score trauma) and interpretation.

If you are interested in calculators that assess the severity of other medical conditions, check out the revised trauma score calculator, SOFA score calculator and SAPS II calculator calculators.

We try our best to make our s as precise and reliable as possible. However, this tool can never replace professional medical advice.

Injury severity score

Baker and colleagues created the Injury Severity Score in 1974. This medical score is based on the previously developed Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS) and takes into account the three (out of six) most severe system injuries.

This adjustment allows doctors to add increasing weight to the most severe injuries. According to the study's results, injuries that alone may not be life-threatening can significantly influence mortality when combined with other trauma.

Injury Severity Score calculation

In this paragraph, you will find information on how to calculate Injury Severity Score.

Trauma in the ISS score can be related to six regions of the human body:

Head and neck (includes cervical spine);
Face: facial skeleton, nose, mouth, eyes, and ears;
Chest: thoracic spine and diaphragm;
Abdomen: abdominal organs and lumbar spine (includes pelvic contents);
Extremities or pelvic girdle: pelvic skeleton; and
External

Each part of the body is then scored for the worst injury as follows:

Severity	Score
No injury	$0$ 0
Minor	$1$ 1
Moderate	$2$ 2
Serious	$3$ 3
Severe	$4$ 4
Critical	$5$ 5
Unsurvivable	$6$ 6

After scoring each body system, we perform the injury severity score calculation according to the following rules:

Choose the three most severely injured body systems.
Perform Injury Severity Score calculation by adding the three highest squared scores :

ISS = highest_{1}^{2} + highest_{2}^{2} + highest_{3}^{2}

ISS=highest12+highest22+highest32

If any body system has a score of 6, ISS is automatically set to have the highest value - $75$ 75 points.

ISS score trauma interpretation

Now that you know how to calculate Injury Severity Score, let's take a look at its interpretation:

Injury Severity Score (ISS) takes values from $0$ 0 to $75$ 75 points;
ISS score is the only anatomical scoring system that correlates linearly with mortality, morbidity, hospitalization time, and other severity measures;
We associate ISS score $>$ 15>15 with major trauma; and
Bolorunduro et al. proposed the following classification of the injuries:

$ISS$ ISS	Severity
$<$ 9<9	Minor
$9$ 9 - $15$ 15	Moderate
$16$ 16 - $24$ 24	Severe
$\geq$ 25≥25	Very severe/profound

Injury Severity Score calculator - a practical example

It would help you check you know how to calculate Injury Severity Score if we used a practical example of a patient who has been in a car crash. Doctors graded his injuries as follows:

Worst injury in the region	Score
Head and neck	No injury ( $0$ 0 points)
Face	Minor ( $1$ 1 points)
Chest	Moderate ( $2$ 2 points)
Abdomen	Serious ( $3$ 3 points)
Extremity	No injury ( $0$ 0 points)
External	No injury ( $0$ 0 points)

First, we need to find the regions with the highest score. In this example, those are:

Abdomen - $3$ 3 points
Chest - $2$ 2 points
Face - $1$ 1 point

Now we can calculate the patient's Injury Severity Score (ISS score trauma) as follows:

ISS = highest_{1}^{2} + highest_{2}^{2} + highest_{3}^{2} = 3^{2} + 2^{2} + 1^{2} = 9 + 4 + 1 = 14

ISS=highest12+highest22+highest32=32+22+12=9+4+1=14

This patient's injuries can be categorized as moderate. The forces involved in the car crash were, for sure, not risible: you can learn how to calcualte them with our car crash calculator.

FAQs

What does the Injury Severity Score Calculator do?: The Injury Severity Score calculator helps to assess trauma severity, especially in patients with multiple injuries. Use the calculator above for instant results in your browser.
Is the Injury Severity Score Calculator free to use?: Yes. All Try To Calculator tools are free and do not require an account.
Are my inputs stored or sent to a server?: No. Calculations run locally in your browser. We do not collect the numbers you enter or the results shown.
Can I use the Injury Severity Score Calculator for professional decisions?: This tool is for education and quick estimates. For medical, legal, tax, or financial decisions, verify results with a qualified professional.
Where can I find related calculators?: Browse more Health tools on Try To Calculator at /health, or use the related calculators section on this page.

Based on 2 sources

Validating the Injury Severity Score (ISS) in different populations: ISS predicts mortality better among Hispanics and females. — Bolorunduro OB, Villegas C, Oyetunji TA, Haut ER, Stevens KA, Chang DC, Cornwell EE 3rd, Efron DT, Haider AH.
The injury severity score: a method for describing patients with multiple injuries and evaluating emergency care. — Baker SP, O'Neill B, Haddon W Jr, Long WB

Injury Severity Score Calculator

Injury severity score

Injury Severity Score calculation

ISS score trauma interpretation

Injury Severity Score calculator - a practical example

FAQs

Based on 2 sources

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