A study was done looking at two vehicle collisions that included a passenger car and a light truck, defined as a minivan, van, pickup truck or SUV). They looked at the likelihood of having a fatality, a hospitalization, and the hospitalization charges, looking at vehicle type to see if there was any difference between passenger vehicles and light trucks.
They used data from Minnesota’s Crash Outcome Data Evaluation System or CODES between the years 2004 and 2005. They looked specifically for crash data involving a car and a light truck; only police-reported accidents were used. They were curious about defining a model that predicted the rate of hospitalization depending on various variables. They also did a model of the likelihood of a fatality. In all models, they made a distinction between the two types of vehicles and controlled for factors like occupant, vehicle and crash characteristics. There were separate models for drivers and passengers.