Burns : journal of the International Society for Burn Injuries
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Of the 9558 unnatural deaths admitted to the PTA MLL during this time period, 291 (3.0%) of the fatalities met the inclusion criteria. The male:female ratio was 2.9:1. Most fatalities occurred between the ages of 0-4 years. One hundred and forty-two (142) decedents were charred beyond recognition. Identification was confirmed in 134 (94.4%) of the charred remains. In 208 (69.8%) of the cases the manner of death was deemed to be accidental, 23 (7.9%) were homicidal and 11 (3.8%) were suicides. Two hundred and fifty-five (87.4%) of the fatalities were as a result of open flames/fires. Shack fires were responsible for 105 (36%) of all fatalities. In 32 (11.0%) cases of open flame/fire fatalities where death occurred at the scene of injury, more than one fatality was reported per incident. In 122 (79.2%) of scene fatalities, soot deposition was noted in the upper and lower airways. Forty-five (32.8%) of hospital fatalities occurred within 24 h of admission. The most common complications in hospital fatalities were from the respiratory system. The mean blood alcohol concentrations (BAC) was 0.09 g/100 ml. The mean carboxyhaemoglobin concentrations (COHb) was 19.9%. All available cyanide results were negative. ⋯ The study is the first of its kind in South Africa to generate bimodal descriptive statistics for burn fatalities. Approximately 3% of unnatural deaths at the PTA-MLL were due to burns, occurring at a rate of ±1 death per week. The data provides a platform for funding, collaborative research, planning and development of public health programs.
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The objective of this study was the adaptation of the Burn Specific Health Scale-Revised (BSHS-R) into the Portuguese context. The authors of the original version of BSHS-R with 31 items are Blalock, Bunker and DeVellis and it was developed to evaluate the health status of burns victims. The Brazilian version of the BSHS-R was translated from Portuguese (Brazil) to Portuguese (Portugal), through a semantic adaptation process, by independent Portuguese-Brazilian specialists, followed by a verbal comprehension assessment of all items, with a heterogeneous group of people, in terms of age, education and occupation. ⋯ The results analysis allowed to assess and identify the validity of the construct through the factorial exploratory analysis, which confirmed the same previous factorial structure identified in the original language and in the Brazilian version. The BSHS-R also presented good internal consistency indicators (global α = .921; affect and body image α = .874; heat sensitivity α = .830; simple functional abilities α = .893; treatment regimens α = .772; work α = .876; interpersonal relationships α = .804). The Portuguese (Portugal) adapted version has revealed useful, valid and reliable for the quality of life assessment related to the health of people that suffered burn injuries.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Effects of religious and spiritual care on burn patients' pain intensity and satisfaction with pain control during dressing changes.
Spiritual care, beside other nursing interventions, creates a balance in body, psyche and soul in order to holistically recover one's health. This research aims to study the effects of a religious and spiritual care program on the intensity of pain and the satisfaction with pain control during the dressing changes for the burn patients in a hospital in Iran in 2017. ⋯ A religious and spiritual care can help decrease the pain intensity caused by the dressing change and can increase the satisfaction of these patients with pain control. Therefore, it is recommended that the nurses apply the spiritual cares to alleviate the pain and to increase the satisfaction with pain control in burn patients.
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Knowledge of the epidemiology of burn-related fatalities is limited, with most previous studies based on hospital and burn centre data only. ⋯ This study has identified the importance of examining all burn-related fatalities. If this is not done, vulnerable population subgroups will be missed and prevention efforts poorly targeted.
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Significant disfigurement and dysfunction is caused by hypertrophic scarring, a prevalent complication of burn wounds. A lack of objective tools in the assessment of scar parameters makes evaluation of scar treatment modalities difficult. 3D stereophotogrammetry, obtaining measurements from 3D photographs, represents a method to quantitate scar volume, and a 3D camera may have use in clinical practice. To validate this method, scar models were created and photographed with a 3D camera. ⋯ No significant differences were found between the two methods of volume calculation (p = 0.89), and a plot of the differences showed agreement between the methods. The correlation coefficient between the two observers' measurements of scar model volume was 0.92, and the intra-class correlation coefficient for patient scar volume was 0.998, showing good reliability. The time required to capture 3D photographs ranged from 2 to 6 min per patient, showing the potential for this tool to be efficiently incorporated into clinical practice. 3D stereophotogrammetry is a valid method to reliably measure scar volume and may be used to objectively measure efficacy of scar treatment modalities to track scar development and resolution.