BURN WOUND INFECTION;

Abstract

Background: Burn injuries are common and major health problem throughoutthe world. The burn wound represents as a favorable area for opportunistic colonization ofmicroorganisms with exogenous and endogenous origin. In burns patients infections arisefrom multiple sources. Burn wounds become initially colonized and infected with Gram positivebacteria, mainly Staphylococci, that are superseded during the second week by Gram Negativebacteria. Objectives: it is a microbial surveillance retrospective study; that aimed to evaluatethe significance of Rule of nine in diagnosis of aerobic bacterial burn wound infection andcarried out in between June 2007 to September 2011 in the Department of Pharmaceutics,University of Karachi. Study Design: Descriptive retrospective study. Materials: A total of 118patient irrespective of age, sex, date and time of burn, date and time of hospital admission,interval between time of burn and hospital admission, degree and percentage (%) of burn andduration of hospital stay (when specimen collected) were registered for this study. All patientswere divided into two groups (A and B). Results: Out of 58 patients of group A isolation rate perpatient was 1.1 while in group B it becomes 3.0. According to TBSA the isolation rate in groupB rises with rise in TBSA. Most prevalent organism in these patients was found S. aureus(23%)P.aeruginosa(21%). Conclusions: Burn patients are incubator for variety of aerobic bacteriaand rate of isolation of these organisms increase with rise in TBSA. The wounds of these patientmust required continuous microbial surveillance that may reduce the rate of mortality