Pediatric burn injury at home over 30 years: A road to future prevention.

Burns

Department of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Keio University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan. Electronic address:

Published: November 2024

AI Article Synopsis

  • Injury prevention for pediatric burns at home is important, and this study aimed to understand burn injury trends in urban areas over 30 years.
  • Using data from various burn centers and authorities in Tokyo, researchers analyzed 1,092 pediatric burn cases, categorizing them by mechanism, severity, and outcomes across five 6-year intervals.
  • Results showed a decrease in flame burns and hospital stay duration, but scald burns remained stable, indicating a need for more interventions to prevent these types of injuries.

Article Abstract

Introduction: Injury prevention is valuable for pediatric burns at home. To develop future target of prevention, we aimed to elucidate characteristics and chronological changes of pediatric burn injuries at home in urban areas.

Patients And Methods: We conducted a retrospective observational study using the database of the Tokyo Burn Unit Association, which comprises 14 tertiary burn centers, the Tokyo Fire Department, Tokyo Medical Association, and the Tokyo city government. We included pediatric patients aged ≤ 15 years who had a burn injury at home in the last 30 years and divided them into five groups at 6-year intervals. We compared the mechanism, severity, and outcome of burn injuries between the groups.

Results: We included 1092 pediatric patients, with no significant chronological changes in the incidence of burn injuries at home (approximately 200 patients in each 6-year period). The median age was 1 year in all the groups. Flame burns decreased from 7.7 % to 1.6 %, whereas scald burns remained at > 80 %. The burn area decreased from 10 (5-16) % total body surface area (%TBSA) to 7 (3-11) %TBSA. The length of hospital stay was reduced from 6 to 2 days, and in-hospital mortality was 0.4-0.5 % in the last decade.

Conclusions: The incidence of flame burns and burn area decreased over time with improving clinical outcomes in pediatric burns. The number of scald burns remained the same over time; thus, further social intervention is needed to prevent scald burns.

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Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.burns.2024.107317DOI Listing

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