A scoping review of burn care in Southeast Asia

BACKGROUND

Non-fatal burns are a major cause of morbidity, with incidents often occuring at home and at work. Almost all burn cases occur in the WHO region, precisely in African and Southeast Asian countries. Yet, the epidemiology of these injuries, especially in the WHO-defined Southeast Asian Region, has yet to be adequately defined.

METHOD

A scoping review of the literature was performed to identify epidemiology of thermal, chemical, and electrical burns in the WHO-defined Southeast Asian Region. The database search screened 1023 articles in total, of which 83 articles were assessed for eligibility at a full-text level, and 58 of these were excluded. Therefore, 25 full-text articles were included for data extraction and analysis.

RESULTS

Data analysed included demographics, injury details, burn mechanism, total body surface area burned, and in-hospital mortality.

CONCLUSION

Despite the steady increase on burns research, the Southeast Asian region is still limited in terms of burns data. This scoping review has shown that the largest set of articles on burns come from Southeast Asia, indicating the importance of reviewing data at a regional or local level, as global studies tend to be dominated by data from high-income countries.

Amphiphilic Chitosan Porous Membranes as Potential Therapeutic Systems with Analgesic Effect for Burn Care

Eliminating or at least lessening the pain is a crucial aspect of burns management, as pain can negatively affect mental health and quality of life, and it can also induce a delay on wound healing. In this context, new amphiphilic chitosan 3D porous membranes were developed and investigated as burns therapeutic systems with analgesic effect for delivery of lidocaine as local anesthetic. The highly porous morphology of the membranes and the structural modifications were evidenced by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis and infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). Improved compression mechanical properties, long-term hydrolytic degradation (28 days) evaluation and high swelling capacities (ranging from 8 to 22.6 g/g) indicate an increased capacity of the prepared membranes to absorb physiological fluids (burns exudate). Lidocaine in vitro release efficiency was favored by the decreased content of cross-linking agent (reaching maximum value of 95.24%) and the kinetic data modeling, indicating that lidocaine release occurs by quasi-Fickian diffusion. In addition to the in vitro evaluation of analgesic effect, lidocaine-loaded chitosan membranes were successfully investigated and proved antibacterial activity against most common pathogens in burns infections: Staphylococcus aureus and Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.

Survey on Knowledge of First Aid Management of Burns Amongst Medical and Non-medical Students in Karachi, Pakistan: Need for an Educational Intervention?

Background: Burn related injuries (BRIs) are relatively common, mostly accidental, and highly preventable forms of injury. First aid management of BRIs can have a significant impact on the outcome and morbidity of these injuries, yet there seems to be an inadequacy in the knowledge related to burn management worldwide. Hence, our study aimed to delineate the level of knowledge and awareness of burn first aid treatment (BFAT) amongst undergraduate students, and the impact training courses had on that knowledge.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted by employing undergraduate medical and non-medical students from various universities of Karachi, Pakistan. By means of convenience sampling, 400 students were sent online, structured questionnaires. The analysis was conducted using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 23.0, IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, US), and associations calculated through t-tests. A mean knowledge score was calculated to assess the participant’s adequacy of knowledge regarding BFAT.

Results: Medical students had a better knowledge score than their non-medical counterparts (5.8 ± 1.6 versus 3.6 ± 1.5, P < 0.01), however, overall knowledge of BFAT remained inadequate amongst participants. Students who received formal training scored a higher mean knowledge score than the majority of students with no training (P < 0.01).

Conclusion: The majority of students had insufficient overall knowledge about BFAT, highlighting the need for integrating this topic into the curriculum. In addition, education of the masses via multimedia and conducting formal training courses, are both imperative in raising awareness and reducing the occurrence of BRIs.