The prevalence of comorbidities among acute burn patients

Abstract

Introduction: The elderly population in Iran is growing, and more medical comorbidities can be identified, so hospital admissions of burn patients with associated medical comorbidities are expected to rise as well. As these medical comorbidities may affect the prognosis of burn patients, additional health care services are likely to be required. Therefore, the aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of comorbidities among patients with burn injury. Methods: A retrospective study of all burn patients admitted to the Motahari Burn Hospital, Iran over a 14-month period was conducted. Variables gathered from patients' medical record files were demographic characteristics, clinical burn features, hospital course, and preexisting comorbidities. The comorbidity score of patients was calculated by using the updated Charlson comorbidity index. Results: A total of 732 patients were hospitalized, 136 (18.5%) patients had comorbidities, and more than 57% of elderly people (!61 years) had one or more comorbid conditions. The most common cause of burn injury among the comorbid patients was scald (38.2%) injury. The two most frequent comorbid conditions among all cases were congestive heart failure (25.8%) and diabetes (23.5%), respectively. As patients got older, the Charlson score also increased. There were no significant differences between comorbid and noncomorbid patients in terms of hospitalization period and mortality rate. Those comorbid patients who died had significantly higher Charlson score and larger mean burn sizes compared to surviving comorbid patients; they were also significantly older. Conclusion: The prevalence of comorbidities in burn patients was 18.5% and among older burn patients rose to 57%. Diabetes and congestive heart failure were the two most common comorbid conditions.

External Validation of Three Burn-Specific Mortality Prediction Models in Adult Burn Patients at a Tertiary Care Hospital in India

“…The reason for the differences in our results when compared with the training population 5 6 7 and other validation populations 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 are explained by the differences in the population characteristics and the healthcare infrastructure of our setup. The patients in our study were more severely burnt and had a high incidence of inhalational injury.…”

“…The study by Salehi et al concluded an excellent discriminative ability in the Iranian population. 15 The population characteristics matched the characteristics of our sample. The mortality rate reported was 69.71%.…”

“…The ABSI has been extensively validated in the developed world 8 9 10 11 12 13 and two developing countries, Ghana 14 and Iran. 15 Brusselaers et al studied the performance of ABSI in the Ghanaian population and reported excellent discrimination. 14 It should be noted that the study sample was a mix of children and adults with a median age of 10.5 [2.5,2.7], median TBSA burned of 21 [11, 34], and only two patients required intubation.…”

“…The mortality rate reported was 69.71%. 15 The excellent discrimination might be the result of high mortality and the tendency of ABSI to overestimate mortality. 9 11 14 Furthermore, being a developing country, the facilities available in the country have similarities to what were available in the United States of America in the 1980s and therefore this might actually indicate a developmental gap.…”

“…The rBaux score has been extensively validated in the developed countries 8 9 10 11 12 13 16 17 and the Caucasian population and only two studies tested it in developing countries. 14 15 Brussealers et al 14 studied the model in the Ghanaian population and Salehi et al 15 studied the same in the Iranian population. Both these studies had an AUROC of > 0.8.…”