Hypothermia Deaths

Main points

• In total, 52 deaths involving hypothermia were registered in Scotland in 2016. Hypothermia was the underlying cause of 15 of those deaths. In the other 37 deaths which involved hypothermia, the underlying cause was another medical condition or circumstance, such as heart disease, an alcohol problem or fall: hypothermia did not cause those deaths, but it was mentioned on the death certificate because it was believed to have contributed to the death (for example by hastening its occurrence). More information about the distinction between the ‘underlying cause’ of death and ‘contributory factors’ to death is available via Death Certificates and Coding the Causes of Death section of this website.

• Table 1 shows that the number of deaths involving hypothermia varies widely from year to year. Figures on the basis of the current Definition of the Statistics (available on this website) are available with effect from 2000. On average, there were 72 deaths per year over the period since then, with the number being lowest (28) in 2014 and highest (110) in 2001. There seems to be a clear difference between the first three years (2000 to 2002), which had an average of 104 deaths per year involving hypothermia, and the latest six years (2011 to 2016), which clearly had lower numbers of such deaths (64, 48, 67, 28, 42 and 52, respectively). In the intervening period (2003 to 2010), the number of deaths involving hypothermia fluctuated between 70 and 83, with little evidence of any trend in those years. When figures are around that level, one can expect quite large percentage year-to-year fluctuations, regardless of whether or not there is any underlying trend (as is explained in the ‘Definition of the Statistics’ page and, in more detail, in the deaths background Fluctuations section of our website). Therefore, statistics of hypothermia deaths must be used with care: for example, ‘random’ variation alone could cause a rise between one year and the next. As the figure for 2014 was clearly lower than in any of the previous fourteen years for which such numbers are available, it was not surprising that there was an increase in 2015; likewise, as the figure for 2015 was the second-lowest since 2000, a further rise in 2016 was also not surprising. Despite that increase, in 2016, the total number of deaths involving hypothermia (52) was the fourth lowest of the 17 years for which figures are now available, the only lower annual totals being 28 for 2014, 42 for 2015 and 48 for 2012.

• In every year for which figures are available, hypothermia was the underlying cause of well under half of the deaths in which it was involved. Table 1 also gives the numbers of deaths involving hypothermia broken down by sex. There are generally more hypothermia deaths among men than women, although there have been a few years when this has not been the case.

• The numbers of deaths which involve hypothermia are broken down by age-group in
  Table 2. Most are of older people: of the total for the period since 2000, 59% of deaths involving hypothermia were of people who were aged 65 or over, and 32% were aged 80 or over.

• Tables 3 and 4 give figures for each Health Board and council area, most of which are in single figures for any given year, and so may fluctuate greatly (in percentage terms) from one year to the next.