Profile of pediatric burns - Indian experience in a tertiary care burn unit

Pediatric burns admitted to the tertiary care burn facility of Kanchi Kamakoti CHILDS Trust Hospital in Chennai (India) were retrospectively analysed between 1992 and 2003. Five hundred and thirty-five burn cases were admitted during these years. These children belonged to the age group of 0-18 years (as WHO has increased the pediatric age group range to 0 to 18 years). The etiology of these burns was looked into and the outcome of these patients in respect to etiology and complications were studied. After analysis, they were classified according to age, sex, TBSA and the occurrence of infection during the course of treatment. The complications that really affected the outcome were looked into and infection ranked first in fatal cases. Inhalation burns were not very common in our group and were associated only with large flame burns, which occur when a child is burnt while the mother commits suicide, or in cases of abuse of female children in a closed room with lots of inflammable upholstery. Scalds were the most common type of burn among children under 4 years of age. Flame burns predominated the older age group. Although there were 13 deaths among the entire group, the majority occurred within the 2-4 years age group. There was no significant gender difference with respect to mortality. Large burn size and infection were the strongest predictors of mortality. (c) 2004 Elsevier Ltd and ISBI. All rights reserved.