Motor Vehicle Deaths and Crashes

For questions about this data, send email to vstat@dshs.texas.gov or call (512) 776-7509

Data Sources

Texas Vital Statistics (VSTAT), Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) Annual Texas motor vehicle crash statistics,

Data Description and Measure Information

Motor Vehicle Crashes are total crashes occurring within a Texas county as reported by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). A crash is defined as involving a motor vehicle in transport, but not involving aircraft or watercraft; and occurs or originates on a traffic way, results in injury to or death of any person, or damage to the property of any one person to the apparent extent of $1,000.

Data are provided by annual Crashes and Injuries by County obtained from the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) at: https://www.txdot.gov/data-maps/crash-reports-records/motor-vehicle-crash-statistics.html

Motor Vehicle Deaths are deaths that occur by county or region of residence and are those which include one of the following ICD-10 codes for the underlying cause of death on Texas Death Certificates:

V20-29 Motorcycle rider injured in transport accident
V30-V39 Occupant of three-wheeled motor vehicle injured in transport accident
V40-V49 Car occupant injured in transport accident
V50-V59 Occupant of pick-up truck or van injured in transport accident
V60-V69 Occupant of heavy transport vehicle injured in transport accident
V70-V79 Bus occupant injured in transport accident

For deaths, data suppression are indicated with "- -" for both counts and rates. Suppression occurs for counts that are 9 or less, or for rates that have fewer than 21 cases in the numerator.

When a data spreadsheet is downloaded, suppressed values will appear as "-1"

Race and Ethnicity "Non-Hispanic Other" race/ethnicity category also includes records with Unknown race/ethnicity and Multiple race responses

Population counts and rates utilize population projections from the 2018 Texas Demographer State Projection 1.0 Migration Scenario Projections: https://demographics.texas.gov/Data/TPEPP/Projections/.
Sub-groups that meet suppression criteria for low values are not shown.

Border counties include the following counties: Brewster, Brooks, Cameron, Crockett, Culberson, Dimmit, Duval, Edwards, El Paso, Frio, Hidalgo, Hudspeth, Jeff Davis, Jim Hogg, Kennedy, Kinney, La Salle, Maverick, McMullen, Pecos, Presidio, Real, Reeves, Starr, Sutton, Terrell, Uvalde, Val Verde, Webb, Willacy, Zapata, and Zavala. Non-Border counties include all other counties not included as border counties and deaths where the county is unknown.

Additional Information

Texas DSHS Vital Statistics https://www.dshs.texas.gov/chs/vstat/Default.shtm
TxDOT https://www.txdot.gov/
Center for Health Statistics
National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) - Mortality
Texas Public Health Regions