599 A Retrospective Outcome Analysis of the Involvement of Department of Child Services in Suspected Cases at a Major Regional Pediatric Burn Center

Abstract

Abstract Introduction Cases of child abuse are an important manifestation of pediatric burns owing to their nature and all too common occurrence. In our institution, the Department of Child Services (DCS) is often frequently involved in minimally suspicious cases in conjunction with or even before the internal child protective team involvement. To our knowledge, there is no recent literature evaluating the outcome of DCS involvement in suspected cases in pediatric burn populations. Methods We performed a retrospective chart analysis of the pediatric burn patient database at our institution from 2017–2020. We identified 116 out of 565 patients who matched our criteria for the involvement of DCS. We collected the following information: age, race, address at time of injury, payer source, where DCS involvement was initiated, and the outcome of the investigation. Results We found that 20.5 % of all the pediatric burn patients admitted from 2017–2020 had DCS involvement. Of the total admitted patients only 3.8% were removed from the previous caregivers. The factors that were found to be statistically significant were male sex, age under 3 years, Caucasian child with single parent and living in an urban setting. A higher incidence was noted in the capital city area compared to the rest of the state. There was no statistical difference noted among races, location of DCS notification, and payer source. Conclusions We conclude that vigilance and early reporting is essential in detecting child abuse. Involvement of the multidisciplinary child protection team at our institution may reduce the burden on DCS. Screening out high risk factors such as age less than 3 years old, male sex, and single parent of Caucasian race may assist in detecting the non-accidental burn victims. We will target prevention educational outreach programs to the community to decrease the occurrence of child abuse in the future.