One would wonder why is this treatment different from other trauma like accidents?

Well, it is common sense. A severe burn requires special attention. The glucose levels drop dramatically in a burns patient, as his/her body ousts as much fluid as possible to combat any infection. In turn, the patient’s immunity is extremely low – and thus the patient is exceedingly susceptible to infection. This infection could spread through out the body if not treated immediately, and in turn it can cause further complications to the patient. Also, if some burns can deepen if not treated accurately and immediately.

In addition, burns treatment includes special dressing requirements. Sometimes a person needs special dressings to be created – special bandages etc, which need to be custom made for the patient. This may not be a possibility if it is a regular hospital.

Also for the first few days – of any burns trauma – a person needs to be monitored consistently for particular levels – which can generally only be provided in special – Burns Intensive Care Units. These units are designed keeping in mind the pain people go through with different levels of burns. Some units actually have water beds to ease the pain the patients endure.

Additional treatment includes dissolving the dead skin with enzymatic agents, as well as allowing the skin below it to heal. Sometimes a skin graft is needed which needs consistent monitoring to ensure the wound heal properly.

All this care and more can only be provided in Burns ICUs, and hence evolves the need for specialized treatment for burns patients.

The accident had taken place on July 10 at Goregaon (E) on the Western Express Highway, when a vehicle hit the car in which the deceased, Mandar Korgaonkar, was travelling. After battling for his life in a hospital for 22 days, Mandar breathed his last on Monday.

Mandar’s mother, Dr Leena Korgaonkar, said, “Nothing can compensate our loss. We felt the best way to immortalise Mandar would be by donating his organs.’’ Leena said the family wanted to donate Mandar’s kidneys too, but the doctors told them that it was not possible.

Dr Shilpa Karnik from the National Burns Centre at Airoli said that skin obtained from such donations is used as a protective patch on burns patients. “The patch helps to arrest infection and speed up the healing process,’’ said Karnik. “Ideally, skin should be donated within six to 12 hours of a person’s death. It is also possible for a living person to donate skin,” Karnik added.

People interested in skin donation can contact the burns helpline on 27643333.

Courtesy: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Kin-donate-accident-victims-skin-eyes/articleshow/4857965.cms

MUMBAI: The death of a 78-year-old woman, Suman Marathe, following a gas leak in her Prabhadevi residence has been in the spotlight recently. The huge explosion shook her entire apartment.

But shockingly, several such women are silently succumbing to burn injuries in Mumbai. Of the total deaths during 2008 and 2009 (till August) as a result of burn injuries in the city, roughly around 70% are women, 25% are men and 5% are children, says Dr Shilpa Karnik of the National Burns Centre in Airoli.

The recent Human Development report prepared by United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) for Mumbai with the help of the BMC reveals that though the total number of deaths from burns have come down in the year 2005 as compared to 2000, more women are succumbing to kitchen fires.

“The mortality rate and occurrence of burn incidents is more among women than men. In 2000, of the total 1,453 deaths from burns in Mumbai, 1,002 were women as against 451 men. Similarly, of the total 906 deaths because of burn injuries registered in the city in 2005, 517 were female and 389 male,” stated the report. According to Karnik, the proportion remains the same.

Dr S Keswani said most of these deaths are suicidal or homicidal. “Some times, it is difficult to get clues as a patient is rushed to a nearby nursing home and the police ignore the registration,” he pointed out. According to Keswani, the accurate number of burn cases and deaths among women is not registered or calculated as the government does not compile such statistics and police figures are incomplete as well as unreliable.

Dr Karnik said around 55% of the cases of burn injuries in women succumb as they receive more than 70% burns. According to Karnik, more than half of the women who die are young, up to 35 years of age.

According to fire brigade sources, the total number of female casualties is more than male in the case of fire incidents over the last one year. There were 4,967 fire emergency calls during 2008-2009 in which over 700 people got injured and over 200 died, most among them females, sources said.

This marked the first time in history when the National Burns Centre housed more than fifty patients at one time. A team of surgeons, nurses, and volunteers from Operation Smile, worked hand in hand with the Team at NBC and that of the Rotary Club of Deonar to pull together this never before event.

The patients had been pre screened, as well as all the medical tests had also taken place in advance. The Operation Smile team began work on the 9, January, 2010 and continued till the 17, January. Post surgery treatment included dressings, monitoring, etc, in addition to physiotherapy and rehabilitation.

During this period special burns treatment seminars were conducted for surgeons, nurses and medical students to learn how to deal with burns.

As she laid the foundation for hope for many people to realize the potential of life, we are trying to deliver the message of the need for skin donation. Skin donation is not the same as donating blood or plasma. Its giving someone hope to live even after your own death. Cadaver donors have the opportunity to pledge their Skin for treatment of those who are desperately trying to survive major burns. In India, we need more than a few thousand donors annually, and we barely receive a hundred donors. Spreading the word for the need to donate skin is the only way one can rest assured.

Skin Donation is a simple process where after a person’s death a specialist will remove a layer of their skin – which will provide as a human bandage for a traumatically burnt person. The area where the skin is removed will be bandaged well before the cadaver is returned to the family. This skin is the best possible form of a dressing as it is human tissue helping the damaged skin to regenerate itself.

Thus, even after life ends, one can serve a greater purpose, help us – save life.

Click here to register to donate your skin.

http://bit.ly/7HGaJp

1. This is a scald burn. These are generally very painful Scald injuries that describe burns caused by hot liquids or steam. Roughly, 25 percent of scald injuries result from tap water that is too hot for safe use. Hot water injuries occur in the bathroom and the kitchen. Tap water burns are associated with more death than other hot liquid burns. They tend to be more severe and cover a larger portion of the body.

2. This is a heat burn. Heat or thermal burns occur when the skin touches a hot surface. The skin may either be in contact with hot liquids, flames, steam, flash, or extremely hot surfaces. The minimum temperature that could cause heat burns is 115º F. This can occur anywhere at home like exposure to irons, stoves, hot kettles, and others.

3. Chemical burns can occur in the home, at work or school, and as a result of accident or assault. Although few people in the United States die after contact with chemicals in the home, many substances common in both living and storage areas can do serious harm.

Many chemical burns occur accidentally through misuse of products such as those for hair, skin, and nail care. Although injuries do occur at home, the risk of sustaining a chemical burn is much greater in the workplace, especially in businesses and manufacturing plants that use large quantities of chemicals.

4. Electrical burns are electrical injuries due to electrocution or other such occurrences. Adult electrical injuries usually occur in an occupational setting, whereas children are more often than naught injured in the household setting. The spectrum of electrical injury is very broad, from minimal injury to severe multi organ involvement, with both occult and delayed complications, to death.

5. A sunburn is a burn to living tissue such as skin produced by overexposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation, commonly from the sun’s rays. Usual mild symptoms in humans and animals include red or reddish skin that is hot to the touch, general fatigue, and mild dizziness. An excess of UV-radiation can be life-threatening in extreme cases. Exposure of the skin to lesser amounts of UV radiation will often produce a suntan.

Mumbai: It’s been a year since Kareena Purohit has suffered severe burns on her right leg rendering her invalid. The burn caused a knee joint contracture joining her thigh to the ankle.

However, Kareena now has a ray of hope. She is one of the
50 patients who have been selected for Operation Restore — where patients with contractures and deformities will be treated for free by a team of specialists from the US and UK — at the National Burns Centre (NBC) in Airoli.

“Kareena was playing when our pet dog ran behind her. Scared, she turned around and fell into a container of hot tea,” said Rajasthan-based Babu Purohit, Kareena’s father. “Her clothes stuck to her and a deep layer of skin peeled off when we tried to remove them.”

Kareena was rushed to a local hospital and was treated in Gujarat where the doctors used the skin from her stomach to cure the burn injuries on her leg. However, her thigh and the ankle remained attached. The Purohits could not afford a reconstructive surgery due to lack of funds.

“We will perform a grafting process on Kareena’s leg which will release the contractures after a surgery. This would separate her thigh from her ankle,” said Dr Sunil Keswani, plastic, cosmetic and burns surgeon, NBC.

Keswani and his team will work with doctors from USA and UK, who have been associated with Operation Smile, a children’s charity which treats cleft lips and cleft palates all around the world. The patients will be operated in a 10-day-camp starting from Saturday.

However, our story is not about the hills of Lonavla.

Renuka and her friends were on their way to Lonavla – dreaming of the entire day of pure recluse from their college and work. The perfect expressway drive with the grass blankets on either side, with little brooks welcoming you to step in them on either side – there’s nothing more you could ask for! Unfortunately, for our protagonist she didn’t reach the expressway. One minute they were zooming towards the expressway and the next thing she knew she was trying to hold herself up while the car rammed into the divider and turned turtle thrice.

The next thing she knew was that she was being helped to the ambulance to be taken to the ICU. Her left leg was unbearably painful and unrecognizable. Doctors told her she would be fine. She is fine. Only the ordeal gave her a lot to learn. Her foot needed a skin graft – something she had never even heard of.

In the next few weeks, Renuka had a split graft, which was taken from her thigh. This graft was used to cover the open wound on her left leg. This type of graft, she learnt that it is called an auto graft. This means the skin graft taken was directly from the patient. The graft was successful and has healed well. Today, her left foot is almost fully healed, she wears a band age to tighten the skin, but this is only temporarily – till it fully heals.

Today, Renuka has pledged to donate her skin to help save other lives. She and her twin having been affected by this incident have realized the need to create awareness about skin donation, and came forth to bring this story to you.

Placing forth a chance – for you to pledge your skin as a cadaver donor. http://bit.ly/7HGaJp

There are different types of burns scars:

1. Keloid Scars: these scars are thick and generally itchy scars. These scars tend to grow outside the border of the actual burn. They are formed due to the excess production of collagen in the body – after the scar has healed.

2. HyperTrophic Scars: These scars are similar to Keloid scars except for the fact that they remain within the boundary of the wound.

3. Burn Deformities or Contractures – these occur when a scar pulls over an edge making the skin tighter than normal (for example – over a joint). These contractures may even produce functional deformities affecting the muscles, joints, and even tendons sometimes. One sees that when a large patch of skin is burnt, the surrounding area of skin will pull itself together to protect the area without any skin. This skin then heals tightly – which causes deformities.

It is thus critical to receive the correct treatment for burns, regardless of the size of the burn. The National Burns Centre specializes in burns treatment of all kinds. The Centre offers one of a kind specialized treatment and is the first specialized burns hospital in India and provides treatment for any form of Burns. The Centre is also working hard to promote fire safety and skin grafting projects across the country.

Patients with severe burns or severely damaged skin need to have temporary grafts of skin to replace the damaged area. One generally sees that the grafted skin used is more often than naught, taken from the patient itself. This is however, not always possible and sometimes external skin grafts are necessary. The general condition of the patient needs to be taken under consideration before any decision can be made.

In these sort of patients one sees that the donated skin can really make the difference between life and death. This skin graft will temporally serve as a biological dressing for the wound. It will promote better and quicker healing of the wound. It also helps prevent loss of the body fluid in the area of the burn – which is crucial for the healing of the wound. In addition to body fluid it prevents the loss of blood and precious proteins which in turn act as barriers to infection, which could otherwise have led to septicemia – which would generally lead to death.

Skin is generally taken from deceased donors – unless it is a dire emergency – when family may decide to donate skin to save a members life if the skin can not be grafted from the patient itself. This skin graft is taken from the epidermis as well as a tiny layer of the dermis. A skin donor is evaluated on an individual basis – not only by visual assessment of the skin, but medical factors play a role as well.