Factors associated with survival of burned patients

Abstract

Background: It is scarce in the literature studies regarding treatment and objective analysis of the survival chances of burned patients. Some investigations indicates the need for obtaining specific data to the population studied and characteristics such as social condition and nutritional status are suggested to be relevant to the patient's evolution. We aimed to describe the mortality of a Treatment Center Burn Unit (BU) in Brazil. Methods: We analyzed 76 burned victims hospitalized with a fatal outcome in the General Hospital of São Matheus in 10 years (1999-2009). The following collected data were investigated were: age, sex, period of permanence, body surface burned (BSB), degree of burns, the causal agent, inhalation injury, nature of the event, clinical complications, mortality and survival rates. Results: We observed predominantly male and the median age was 44 years old. The highest incidence was on June. The mean body surface area burned was 40%, and upper limbs, the most affected region. The causative agents involved were more flammable agents and fire. Pulmonary infection was the most frequent clinical complication. The mortality found in this center was 4.9%. The subgroup of suicide were predominantly female and the mortality rate was 22.44%. When studying survival rate, patients with inhalation injury and trauma were associated with shorter survival. Patients with sepsis remained alive for longer. Conclusion: The clinical, epidemiological and survival of patients with burns, enables the design of peculiar characteristics of this trauma in the studied area, thus, from these data, charts be established treatment and prognostic estimates, and assist in developing preventive public health policy more effective.