Outcome analysis of blunt injury in children.

A group of 1,009 children less than 15 years of age and consecutively admitted to a Pediatric Trauma Center was used to compare outcomes with the adult (15-54 yrs) MTOS norm population using TRISS. Four pediatric age groups (0-1, 0-3, 0-8, 0-14 yrs) formed the study groups. TRISS analysis resulted in no statistically significant difference in predicted outcome between any of the four pediatric groups and the adult baseline group. There were only seven misclassified children (0.69%) with respect to survival/death outcome, indicating the usefulness of TRISS to characterize pediatric blunt trauma. In addition, TRISS was used to delineate the injury severity mix of the pediatric population. A TS less than or equal to 14 and ISS greater than 15 was found to serve as a useful definition of severity in this group of injured children.