The role of carbon monoxide poisoning in the production of inhalation burns.

Because heat and many poisonous chemicals are generated in a fire, studies of inhalation burns have tended to focus on injury by heat and irritative chemicals. In view of the frequent carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning associated with burn deaths and in patients with inhalation burns, however, nonirritative poisonous gases such as CO cannot be disregarded as possible causative factors involved in the production of inhalation burns. Accordingly, we attempted to clarify in animals the effect of nonlethal CO poisoning on inhalation burns due to heated air. The experimental results indicate that inhaling an amount of moderately heated dry air that alone could not cause pulmonary injury produces severe pulmonary injury in the presence of CO. This seems to occur because CO poisoning causes hyperventilation and thus allows a massive amount of heat to reach the lung.