84 Pediatric Scald Burns: Using Geographic Information Systems to Identify High Risk Communities

Abstract

Abstract Introduction Identifying modifiable risk factors for pediatric scald burn injury prevention efforts is an important function for burn registries. Geographic information systems (GIS) analysis can provide additional census tract data about patient home and injury location. We hypothesize that (GIS) analysis of burn registry data using census tract data could identify geographic areas and additional risk factors for pediatric scald burn injury prevention efforts. Methods The burn registry of a U.S. regional burn center was used retrospectively to identify burn admissions, ages 0–17, within the county from 1/1/2018 to 7/31/2020. Data collected included demographics, vitals, burn type and body surface area burned (BSA%), hospital charges, length of stay, complications, and mortality. GIS geocoding of patient home addresses with census tract data including poverty level, languages spoken at home and highest educational level was performed. Burn incident hot spot analysis to identify statistically significant burn incident clusters was done using the Getis Ord Gi* statistic. Results There were 1057 burn initial admissions during the study period, 152 (14.3%) patients were children 17 and younger with scald injury who were county residents. The average age was 4.0 ± 4.0 years, and 59.9% were male. Mean scald injury BSA was 4.9% ± 5.7, 14/152 admissions (9.2%) had a burn ≥10% BSA. There were no in-hospital deaths. 120/728 county census tracts were identified as high risk with higher rates of child scald injury admissions than the countywide mean of 1.27 cases/1000 children. Regression analysis of high-risk census tracts were more likely to have increased poverty levels (O.R. 3.30, 95% C.I.: 1.1–9.7, p< 0.031) and lower educational attainment (O.R. 1.10, 95% C.I.: 1.0–1.18, p< 0.047). Non-white race, unemployment level, living with grandparents and speaking Spanish at home were non-significant risk factors. GIS analysis identified geographic hot spots for child scald injury admissions (p< 0.001). Conclusions GIS analysis of county burn registry data identified census tracts with increased poverty and lower educational attainment levels to have an increased risk of pediatric scald injury admission. Burn prevention efforts should be focused on these high-risk areas.