Ms Akane Katsu¹, Miss Tanya Iddamalgoda¹, Mr Iain Brown², Miss Kate Welsh³, Ms Rachel Edmondson⁴, Ms Julie Bricknell⁴, Mr Matt Tinker⁵

¹Occupational Therapy Department, Royal North Shore Hospital, St Leonards, Australia, ²Assistive Technology & Seating, Northern Sydney Local Health District, North Ryde, Australia, ³Severe Burn Injury Unit, Royal North Shore Hospital, St Leonards, 2065, ⁴Physiotherapy Department, Royal North Shore Hospital, St Leonards, Australia, ⁵Intensive Care Unit, Royal North Shore Hospital, St Leonards, Australia

Abstract:

The inherent risk of pressure injuries for severe burn injury patients begins from the time of their admission into intensive care. Areas such as the occiput, frontal eminence, mental protuberance and ear are most at risk of pressure injury in patients who have significant head and neck burns. A plethora of contributing factors make it challenging to prevent pressure injuries, however, there are risk factors unique to severe burn patients (Gordon et al., 2004, Lewis et al., 2012, Maguina and Kirkland-Walsh, 2014). These include: presence of burn oedema, immobility, sedation, use of vasoactive medications, the use of splints and devices, the integrity of the burn injured skin itself, positioning of the head and neck and concomitant spinal injuries. A series of such injuries in our population prompted our burns team to investigate and review our clinical practice, which includes the use of a neck extension pillow. In the process of auditing our clinical protocol for head and neck positioning post burn injury; we also undertook pressure mapping to establish baseline measurements for our current patients.
This paper will present our findings and recommendations for a prospective study into pressure injury prevention in severe burn injury patients with head and neck burns who require head and neck positioning for the prevention of burn contracture.

References
GORDON, M. D., GOTTSCHLICH, M. M., HELVIG, E. I., MARVIN, J. A. & RICHARD, R. L. 2004. Review of evidenced-based practice for the prevention of pressure sores in burn patients. Journal of Burn Care & Rehabilitation, 25, 388-410.
LEWIS, G. M., PHAM, T. N., ROBINSON, E., OTTO, A., HONARI, S., HEIMBACH, D. M., KLEIN, M. B. & GIBRAN, N. S. 2012. Pressure ulcers and risk assessment in severe burns. Journal of Burn Care & Research, 33, 619-23.
MAGUINA, P. & KIRKLAND-WALSH, H. 2014. Hospital-acquired pressure ulcer prevention: a burn surgeon’s team approach. Journal of Burn Care & Research, 35, e287-93.

Biography:

Akane Katsu is the Senior Burns Occupational Therapist at the Severe Burn Injury Unit, Royal North Shore Hospital. Her interests are in recovery outcomes, complex burn injuries and scar management.