Purpose: To report, analyze different aspects of mass
casualty incidents resulting from household fires due to
explosion of gas cylinders presented to our Burn Unit from
2013 to 2017.
Methods: Data of all burn mass casualty incidents from
admitted to the Burn Emergency Unit of Ain Shams University,
Cairo, Egypt; from January 2013 to December 2017 were
collected from the Burn Unit and its Intensive Care Unit
records, reviewed and described.
Results: Six incidents from flame burn caused by household
explosion of gas cylinders took place in the past 5 years.
33 victims were involved in the incidents and admitted to our
unit; male: female ratio was 2.7:1. The ages of the admitted
patients ranged from 2.6y-51y. The extent of burns ranged
from 10-68% of TBSA affecting head and neck, torso and
extremities. A total numbers of 44 operations were performed
to all the patients during their stay in the form of emergency
escharotomies in 12 patients and 32 sessions of excision of
the deep partial and full thickness burns and split-thickness
skin grafting in 19 patients. All patients survived and discharged
uneventfully except only for 4 deaths (12%) with
mean hospital stay duration of 30 days. Complications that
developed in the admitted cases include wound infections
(12.50%), hypertrophic scars (12.50%), altered skin color
(8.33%) and psychotic manifestations (6.24%).
Conclusion: Retrospective analysis of the therapeutic
data of these cases demonstrates that management of mass
burn causalities requires pre-designed disaster planning, well
equipped center, trained personnel and these are the key
elements in successful management.