Gasoline burns: the preventable cause of thermal injury.

Gasoline related burns are a significant cause of thermal injuries each year in the United States. In this retrospective review of 1858 admissions to our Regional Burn Center from 1979 to 1988, 270 (14.5%) were persons with gasoline-related injuries. Natural gas and other distillates were excluded. Most victims were male (228 of 270); mean age was 27 years; mean burn size was 25% total body surface area. There were 299 skin grafts performed on 172 patients, and there were 16 deaths. The mean length of stay decreased from 38 to 17 days (p less than 0.001) between the first and second 5-year time periods, even though there was no significant change in age or mean burn size. The majority (59%) of gasoline-related burns were the result of inappropriate or unsupervised use of gasoline. The general public is largely unaware of the dangers of gasoline, and further education in this area is needed.