[The changes of characteristics of burn injuries and treatment data of burned adults in Kaunas University of Medicine Hospital in 1981-2001].

About 8000 people get burned in Lithuania every year; over 2000 of them have to be hospitalized. About 500 adults and children, who have heavy burn accidents, are treated in the specialized burn centers in Kaunas and Vilnius. With the flow of time, causes of burn accidents change; new treatment methods appear and are applied, the duration of treatment in the hospital as well as other burn accident data change. Consequently we can conclude that in Lithuania as well as all over the world burns are considered to be a serious medical, psychological, economic and social problem. A retrospective 723 in-patient case study was carried out in order to analyze accident and treatment data. The article deals with accident and in-patient treatment data analysis of the adults hospitalized in 1981, 1985, 1991, 1995 and 2001 at the Department of Plastic Surgery and Burns of Kaunas University of Medicine. In 1981, 1985, 1991, 1995 and 2001, respectively 156, 116, 174, 173 and 106 burn accident adult patients were treated. In all years number of burned male patients was twice higher than of female patients. It was noticed that in most cases people of the employable age got burned; the average age of patients 41.3 years. The main source of burns was flame (47.2%); town inhabitants got burned two times more frequently than villagers. It was found that the number of burns with hot liquids increased. The number of unemployed patients increased as well. The absolute majority of patients were treated due to deep burns (87.55%), the total average of burned area decreased from 12.66% in 1981 to 10.99% in 2001. The number of patients undergoing an operation has grown. Active surgery tactics and early operations gave the possibility to decrease almost twice the duration of in-patient treatment in 2001 in comparison to 1981. The time till the first operation decreased from 19.1 days in 1981 to 7 days in 2001.