State of the Science Burn Research: Burns in the Elderly

Marc G. Jeschke MD PhD Herb A. Phelan MD Steven Wolf MD Kathleen Romanowski MD Sarah Rehou MS Alisa Saetamal MD Joan Weber RN John Schulz III MD Crystal New RN BSN Arek Wiktor MD Charles Foster PharmD Lyndsay Deeter MD Kelly Tuohy BSN RN and the Committee on Elderly Burn Care Advances in burn care have led to significant improvements in the outcomes of burn patients except in the elderly: burn patients ≥65 years of age.1,2 This is reflected in the LD50 for elderly burn patients, which has not significantly changed over the last three decades and is around 30 to 35% TBSA burn.4,8 The lack of improvements is even more impactful when considering that elderly represent the fastest growing population, indicating the expected substantial increase in elderly burn patients over the next decades. Additionally, the amount of burn patients in elderly will not only grow due to the growing population of elderly but also have much higher incidence as elderly are at an increased risk for burn injuries due to thinning skin, decreased sensation, mental alterations, pre-existing comorbidities, and numerous other contributing factors.1–6 The high risk of suffering from burns in the elderly population with the rapid growth of this population will require change to the burn treatment paradigm but, at this time, burn care providers lack treatment guidelines or protocols tailored to the special needs of the elderly burn patient. Complicating elderly burn care is the lack of knowledge about maintaining quality of life, independence, and acceptable long-term outcomes.9,10