10 Fast Facts
about Burns and Burn Treatment
1. More than 1 million Americans are burned each year, half of them children.
45,000 people are burned seriously enough to require hospital care. One tenth that number die of burns, many of them before reaching the hospital.
2. The more serious the burn, the less painful it is.
That is because deep burns destroy nerves along with other skin structures. Superficial burns, such as a sunburn, are more painful because nerve endings are still intact.
3. Burn treatment has advanced dramatically in the past sixty years.
Before World War II, a burn covering no more than 50 percent the total body surface area was fatal in 50 percent of all cases. Today, 95 percent of all burn patients can be saved, including some with burns involving as much as 95 percent of the body.
4. People who are burned are at high risk of hypothermia , abnormally low body temperature.
Regulating body temperature is among the many functions of the skin, the body's vast protective shield. When skin is lost or damaged, heat as well as fluid escapes from the body while bacteria and other disease-causing microbes are able to enter.
5. The very young and the very old are at highest risk of dying from their burns.
The peak ages for getting burned are 5 to 19 and 30 to 39, but burn victims under 5 and over 60 are more likely to die than those in any other age group. Those who live spend more time in the hospital, suffer more complications, and are more significantly disabled by their injuries.
6. Burns are the most complex of all traumatic injuries.
Although it begins as an assault on the skin, a serious burn may eventually develop into a progressive systemic disease. Unless burns are treated promptly and appropriately, all hell breaks loose as body systems respond to the attack. Among the life-threatening consequences are shock, cardiac arrest, asphyxiation and respiratory failure, and damage to vital organs including the brain.
7. The only skin graft that will not be rejected comes from a burn patient's own body.
Manufactured skin substitutes and skin from human cadavers or other animals are eventually recognized by the immune system as foreigners. At best, they act as temporary wound coverings until the burn patient can spare enough healthy skin for grafting. The only exception to this rule is a tissue transplant from someone with the identical genetic make-up—that is, an identical twin.
8. A severely burned patient's metabolic rate may be double what is normal.
A burn wound is like an internal combustion engine run amok—consuming prodigious amounts of fuel and oxygen, and producing carbon dioxide beyond the body's capacity to dispose of it. This deranged state is called hypermetabolism. Unless something is done to stop it, the body will cannibalize itself to feed the frenzy. Instead of using fat as its primary source of energy, the body of a burn victim begins to consume protein, which it extracts from the muscles. The result is muscle wasting that resembles severe starvation and is just as deadly.
9. One of the most effective surface treatments for burns has been in use for more than two centuries.
From ancient times up to the present, silver has been used in various forms to protect burn wounds from infection. This precious metal has been used for medicinal purposes at least since the days of the Roman empire. Today it is used as a silver nitrate solution, an ointment combined with sulfa, and as microcrystals embedded in gauze dressings. Because it fights bacteria in a different way, silver is effective even against antibiotic-resistant bacteria. There is no danger that bacteria will develop resistance as they have to so many modern antibiotics.
10. It takes specialized knowledge and a huge team to treat burn patients.
Serious burns should be treated at a specialized burn center, where expert teams and state-of-the-art equipment can save lives and set in motion the long process of recovery. Modern burn treatment involves a coordinated, multidisciplinary team of surgeons, critical care nurses, respiratory, occupational, and physical therapists, social workers and psychiatrists, pastoral and lay counselors, dietitians, speech pathologists, laboratory and bedside technicians, and a host of other experts with the training and skills needed to reconstruct lives damaged by fire.
Want to know more? Read
BURN UNIT: SAVING
LIVES AFTER THE FLAMES.