• Ahmet Çınar Yastı, Orhan Koç, Emrah Şenel, and Afife Ayla Kabalak.
• Department of General Surgery, Burn Treatment Center, Ankara Numune Training and Research Hospital, Ankara, Turkey. cinaryasti@gmail.com
• Ulus Travma Acil Cer. 2011 Sep 1;17(5):419-22.

BackgroundBurns are among the preventable traumas encountered during childhood. Burn injuries are mostly classified as scalds, flame, electric, and chemical burns. However, each subject has some difference in the course of treatment related to the sub-etiologies. To reveal the importance of milk burns, scald burn patients were studied retrospectively.MethodsDemographics of the patients, burn etiologies, clinical presentations, and clinical courses were analyzed. There were 461 (60.4%) male and 303 (39.6%) female patients, with a 1.52 male to female ratio.ResultsThe mean age of the group was 3.36±2.86 years. There were no difference in burn causes between males and females. The mean burned total body surface area of patients was 16.91±12.63%. Hot milk caused larger, deeper burns than the other scalds and caused more third-degree burns (p<0.001, p<0.001, p<0.05, respectively). Milk burns also resulted in longer hospital stay (days) (p<0.001). The mortality rate was also higher in milk burns than other scalds (p<0.001).ConclusionDue to the more detrimental clinical course, milk burns necessitate special consideration in clinical settings. The most important factor is to be aware that burns are deeper than they appear.

20 keywords...

hide…