Elsevier

Burns

Volume 42, Issue 6, September 2016, Pages 1345-1349
Burns

Pattern of unintentional burns: A hospital based study from Pakistan

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.burns.2016.03.020Get rights and content

Highlights

  • We examine pattern of unintentional burns and its risk factors.

  • Burden of unintentional burn by self was higher.

  • Male gender and no schooling resulted in unintentional by-self burn.

  • Upper limb was frequently affected in unintentional burns.

Abstract

Background

Burns are major cause of morbidity and mortality in developing countries. Better understanding of the nature and extent of injury remains the major and only available way to halt the occurrence of the event. The present study was conducted to determine the prevalence of by self and by other unintentional burn, their comparison and the possible mode of acquisition by obtaining the history of exposure to known risk factors.

Methods

A cross-sectional questionnaire based survey was conducted in Burns Centre of Civil Hospital Karachi, Pakistan and 324 hospitalized adult patients with unintentional burns were consecutively interviewed during August 2013 to February 2014. Information was collected on socio-demographic profile. The source of burn, affected body part and place of injury acquisition in terms of home, outside or work were also noted. Logistic regression model was conducted using SPSS software.

Results

Out of 324 patients, 295 (91%) had unintentional burn by self and 29 (9%) had unintentional burn by others. Male gender were 2.37 times and no schooling were 1.75 times more likely to have self-inflicted unintentional burn. Lower limb and head and neck were less likely to involve in unintentional burn by self.

Conclusion

The burden of unintentional burn by self was considerably higher. Male gender and no schooling were found more at risk to have unintentional burn by self.

Introduction

Burns is the fourth leading cause of death from unintentional injuries [1]. Unfortunately, due to poverty, substandard living conditions, overcrowding and illiteracy, burns are much more prevalent in low and middle income countries (LMICs) [2], [3].

In hospitalized patients, among all burn cases, predominance of unintentional burns has been reported by many studies [4], [5], [6]. A study conducted in Iraq reported that among all burn cases, 93% of cases were unintentional [5]. Similarly, studies from Pakistan revealed prevalence of unintentional burns as 84.6–99.23% [4], [6], [7].

In spite of limited resources in LMICs, the management of burn in these countries is much more difficult due to apathetic behavior of the people. Most of the uneducated families have faith in alternative system of medicine and utilize it with superstition, taboos or with weird religious rituals which make management and treatment of burn complicated [8]. These circumstances highlight the significance of primary prevention of burn in LMICs, particularly unintentional burns as which are mostly preventable [1], [9], [10].

Although studies have been conducted on burns and its risk factors, but majority of the studies were retrospectively reviewed observational studies and restricted to the pediatric burn patients only. For the same reason this study was designed to identify the determinants of risk factors which leads to unintentional burns in adults hospitalized patients.

Section snippets

Data collection procedure

A cross sectional questionnaire-based survey was conducted in Burns Centre of Civil Hospital, Karachi, Pakistan after getting approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS). The data were prospectively collected from all hospitalized patients with more than 18 years of age presented with unintentional burn from August 2013 to February 2014. Patients with intentional burn (suicidal, homicidal), mentally retarded and unconscious patients were

Results

A total of 324 patients had unintentional burn, of which 295 (91%) had unintentional burn by self and 29 (9%) had unintentional burn by other. The median age of the patients was 25 (22–31) years with no statistical difference between unintentional burn by self and unintentional burn by other group (p-value 0.67). The educational status was categorized into no schooling and primary or above as frequency of patients with no schooling found higher (44.13%). Predominance of male gender was found

Discussion

The findings of our study revealed increased rates of unintentional burn by self among hospitalized patients. It was notable that younger age, male gender and no schooling were predominantly higher with unintentional burns. It may be due to the reason that most of the patients had manual work occupation. These people are at high risk of getting higher severity of burns because most of the manual workers are less educated and did not take adequate precautionary measures when dealing with

Conclusion

Unintentional burn by self is considerably higher than unintentional burn by others in adults with male gender and no schooling as high risk group. Efforts should be undertaken to educate youngsters about factors that lead to the incidence of unintentional burns.

Cited by (3)

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    2018, Burns
    Citation Excerpt :

    Burn injury is the fourth most prevalent cause of injury in the world [1,2].

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