Metabolic profiles of thermal trauma.

The study was designed to establish where significant correlations exist in a variety of metabolic substrates and hormone mediators in patients sustaining thermal injury. The factors studied were insulin, human growth hormone, cortisol, glucagon, free fatty acid, triglyceride and glucose. Incorporated into this design was an evaluation of the impact of quantitated severity of injury upon these correlations. In patients sustaining a low severity of injury (Probability of death (p = 2.2 to 33.9) there appeared a loss of glucose regulation in conjunction with insulin resistance without significant interplay of other factors studied. In contrast, patients sustaining high severity injury (p = 46.9 to 100) evidenced correlations between glucagon and glucose (negative), cortisol and free fatty acid indicating a significant role of hyperglucagonemia in these patients. A discriminant function analysis was employed to incorporate all significant variables into a probability model. Only insulin, glucose and glucagon appeared in the optimal classification equation.