This represents 15% of injury hospitalisations and 0.9% of injury deaths. Males were particularly at risk, with a hospitalisation rate 2.6 times as high as females.
Deaths caused by contact with objects are comparatively rare, with just 120 recorded in 2019–20.
Contact with objects (also known as Exposure to inanimate mechanical forces) includes harmful contact with everyday or industrial objects such as knives, tools, machines, and sports equipment. It also includes unintentional injuries caused by guns and non-heat-related injuries caused by explosions. (For heat-related injuries, see Thermal causes.) Transport accidents are covered in their own category, and so are excluded here.
Hospitalisations where the cause of injury is W44 Foreign body entering into or through eye or natural orifice and the type of injury is a foreign body in the respiratory tract (T17.2–T17.8) were previously included in this category. For this update these injuries have been re-classified to Choking and suffocation.
This chapter covers accidental contact with objects. Intentional injuries are included under Intentional self-harm and suicide and Assault and homicide
The most common causes of hospitalisation for injuries due to exposure to inanimate mechanical forces fall under the broad categories listed in Table 1.
Table 1: Causes of hospitalisation due to contact with objects, 2020–21
Cause
|
Hospitalisations
|
%
|
Rate (per 100,000)
|
Contact with blunt objects such as doors, walls, trees, rocks, and sporting equipment (W20–22)
|
22,907
|
27
|
89
|
Contact with knives, glass, and other sharp objects (W25–26)
|
21,749
|
26
|
85
|
Contact with tools or machinery (W27–31)
|
17,469
|
21
|
68
|
Other or unspecified (W23–24, W32, W34–46, W49)
|
21,631
|
26
|
84
|
Total
|
83,756
|
100
|
327
|
Notes
- Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
- Totals may not equal the sum of the rows due to rounding.
- Codes in brackets refer to the ICD-10-AM (11th edition) external cause codes for hospitalisations (ACCD 2019)
- Injuries relating to foreign body in respiratory tract (W44 + T17.2-T17.8) are now included in the Choking and Suffocation category.
Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.
For more detail, see Data tables B15–16.
The most common cause of injury death due to exposure to inanimate mechanical forces was contact with blunt objects such as doors, trees, rocks and sporting equipment (43%) (Table 2).
Table 2: Causes of death due to contact with objects, 2019–20
Cause
|
Deaths
|
%
|
Rate
(per 100,000)
|
Contact with blunt objects such as doors, walls, trees, rocks, and sporting equipment (W20–22)
|
51
|
43
|
0.2
|
Contact with tools or machinery (W27–31)
|
20
|
17
|
0.1
|
Caught, crushed, jammed or pinched in or between objects (W23)
|
15
|
13
|
0.1
|
Contact with knives, glass, and other sharp objects (W25–26)
|
14
|
12
|
0.1
|
Other or unspecified (W24, W32–W49)
|
20
|
17
|
0.1
|
Total
|
120
|
100
|
0.5
|
Notes
- Rates are crude per 100,000 population.
- Totals may not equal the sum of the rows due to rounding.
- Codes in brackets refer to the ICD-10 external cause codes for hospitalisations (WHO 2011).
Source: AIHW National Mortality Database.
For more detail, see Data tables E22–24.
Hospital admissions due to contact with objects appear to have a mild seasonal pattern, with more injuries from November through to March.
The interactive display illustrates other seasonal differences in injury hospitalisations.

Notes
1. Admission counts have been standardised into two 15-day periods per month.
2. A scale up factor has been applied to June admissions to account for cases not yet separated.
Source: AIHW National Hospital Morbidity Database.
The age-standardised rate of hospitalisations due to contact with objects in 2020–21 was 8.8% higher than the previous year. The previous year had seen a dip, probably related to COVID-19 restrictions.
Over the period from 2011–12 to 2016–17 the average annual change was less than 0.1%. There is a break in the time series for hospitalisations between 2016–17 and 2017–18 due to a change in data collection methods (see the technical notes for details).
For deaths due to contact with objects, the average annual change in rate between 2010–11 and 2019–20 was 0.8%.