ABSTRACT

The study was carried out in Kampala International University Teaching Hospital in Bushenyi District western Uganda from January 2016 to December 2016 to determine the description of factors associated with Burn injuries among pediatrics admitted in the surgical ward. The admissions book on the surgical ward was reviewed and from the records department of KIUTH, the information was retrieved using a data collection sheet designed according to the specific objectives and the questionnaire. Collected data were tallied, and analyzed using SPSS. The data collected was presented in form of frequency tables. The majority of the pediatrics were within the age group of (3-5) years and the least were of age group (9-12). More too than many were females accounting to 63.6% and male accounted to 36.4%. Most of these pediatrics were normal and under parental care. Many of the paediatrics home had (4-7) members and (1-3) members. Most of these families were from rural areas and most of the burns were scalds accounting to 50%, followed thermal burns accounting to 31.8%, electric burns were 11.4% and lastly chemical burns accounting to 6.8%. The depth of these burns were majorly partial accounting to 77.3% and mixed accounting to 22.7%. These injuries were mostly accidental and least were suicidal. Most of these burns were got from their parents’ home and many burns were acquired from kitchens. The burns were mostly on upper limbs of the body and lower limbs. Most of the parents delayed seeking medical attention since they took mostly these intervals that is (21-24) hours, (25-48) hours. In conclusion, the study finally found out that burns are important public health problem in Bushenyi especially in children 5 years and below where the description was highest and associated with the ruthlessness of clinical types and time of the burns. Many burns were scalds and thermal burns. It was further found that females were more likely to get burns than males. The need to study further the use of inappropriate first aid materials in burns in relations to short term outcomes would be highly required to inform the policy makers in the district on the outcome and thus develop a possible public health intervention in the community. Therefore the research recommend KIUTH, health workers and the district at large to deeply sensitize and employ health education of communities on measures to prevent burns especially in children.