Primary triage of mass burn casualties with associated severe traumatic injuries

Abstract

A key aim in any mass disaster event is to avoid diverting resources by overwhelming specialized tertiary centers with minor casualties. The most crucial aspect of an effective disaster response is pre-hospital triage at the scene. Unfortunately, many triage systems have serious shortcomings in their methodologies and no existing triage system has enough scientific evidence to justify its universal adoption. Moreover, it is observed that the optimal approach to planning is by no means clear-cut and that each new incident involving burns appears to produce its own unique problems not all of which were predictable. In most major burns disasters, victims mostly have combined trauma burn injuries and form a heterogeneous group with a broad range of devastating injuries. Are these victims primarily burn patients or trauma patients? Should they be taken care of in a burn center or in a trauma center or only in a combined burns-trauma center? Who makes the decision? The present review is aimed at answering some of these questions.

Keywords: burn disaster; casualty triage; fire disaster; preparedness.