Epidemiology of pneumonia in a burn care unit: the influence of inhalation trauma on pneumonia and of pneumonia on burn mortality.

The aim of this study is to determine the epidemiological characteristics of burn patients developing pneumonia, as well as the predisposing factors and the mortality of these patients. Infectious complications present serious problems in severely burned patients. Pneumonia, in particular, is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in burn patients. Patients with inhalation injuries are exposed to a greater risk due to the possible development of infectious complications in the lower respiratory tract. During their stay in our Burn Care Unit, 22.9% of our burn patients developed pneumonia and 10.9 % of these patients died. Risk factors for the development of pneumonia in burn patients were found to be inhalation trauma, high ABSI score, the Baux and modified Baux index, and high ASA score (p<0.01). Age and gender showed no significant correlation to the incidence of pneumonia. In this study we were able to determine the incidence of pneumonia in burn patients, their mortality and the strong correlation of the presence of inhalation injury with the development of pneumonia.