BURN INJURIES AND ASSOCIATED CAUSES IN AL KHARJ PROVINCE OF SAUDI ARABIA: ARE THEY PREVENTABLE?

Introduction:Currently, studies investigated burn injuries and their causes in Saudi Arabia mainly focused on pediatric patients, while epidemiology of burns among the adult population required more exploration. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the pattern of burns and associated factors among both children and adults in one of the largest Saudi Arabian province. Methods: This is a surgical audit type study included patients admitted with the burns to the surgical department of King Khaled Hospital in Al Kharj province of Saudi Arabia. The medical records of 60 patients with burn injuries, admitted from 2010 to 2015 inclusive, were reviewed for demographic factors, the pattern of burns,the severity of burn injuries and associated trauma injury severity score (ISS), the length of hospital stay, the types of burns, and the most common body locations. Descriptive statistics including frequencies, percentages, means, and standard deviations were demonstrated in tables and graphs. Inferential statistics were used to detect significant study associations. The P values less than 0.05 were considered significant. Results: This study included 60 patients, where 57%were non-Saudis and the majority were adult males. The most affected body parts were the upper extremities followed by lower extremities and the head. The most common types of burns where hot liquid burns (43.3%), followed by flame burns (28.3%). The significant correlations were found between the mechanism of burn and patient’s gender and age. The burns area was directly related to the length of hospital stay and correlated well to the age (p=0.037). Conclusion: The hot liquid burns are the most common types of burns followed by the flame burns. The hot liquid burns were commonly affecting Saudi nationality, children and female gender. The areas of burns are well correlated to the age of affected patients and the length of hospital stay.