Ostomy/wound management
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Ostomy/wound management · Mar 2011
Impact of hypernatremia on burn wound healing: results of an exploratory, retrospective study.
Severely burned patients need extensive initial fluid resuscitation. Formulas to calculate fluid needs during burn shock are well established. However, protocols for normalizing circulating fluid volume after cellular integrity has recovered do not exist. ⋯ Patients in this group underwent an average of 1.3 (± 0.8) re-grafting procedures compared to 0.35 (± 0.5) for patients without hypernatremia (P = 0.001). There was good correlation (r = 0.525) between daily infusion-diuresis ratios (IDR) and serum sodium levels, as well as between serum sodium levels and re-skin grafting occurrences (r = 0.62). The results indicate that research to confirm that hypernatremia is an indicator of dehydration and affects skin graft take is warranted and that protocols to optimize fluid volume following burn shock treatment are needed.