전기밥솥으로 인한 유아수부 화상의 임상적 고찰 = A CLINICAL ANALYSIS OF INFANT HAND BURNS BY ELECTRIC RICE COOKER

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

We noticed a high incidence of infants burned by steam through the nozzle of the electric rice cooker. The infants were apparently attracted to the cooker by the high pitched sound made by escaping steam during the first minutes after the rice cooked. These burns seemed to manifest more uniform features than the usual child burns such as scalding and flame burns.
During the past three and one half years we have studied 86 cases of these burn patients : I. e. burn patterns, environmental background of the family, treatment procedures, various hand deformities, and the timing of surgical intervention.
Most of the patients ranged from 8 to 12 month old infants who were in the pediatric developmental stage of being able to creep and/or stand up by holding onto objects. The infants in this stage were attempting to catch the hot, hissing steam and suffered from third degree burns on the hand. The majority of burns were on the volar side of the hand. The unilateral hand was primarily involved. The predilection site was the index finger in one finger burns, and the index and middle finger in multiple finger burns. One finger was involved in 39.3% of all the patients. Cicatrical syndactyly was noted in 18 cases(21.2%) mostly in the second interdigital web. Contracture was also seen. In one-finger burns the PIP joint area was primarily involved(52.6%) : while in two finger burns the MP joint area suffered followed by syndactyly due to scarring.
The children at greatest risk were those with less educated mothers, living in a rented traditional Korean home in one or two rooms, whose first child was under 1 year old. The optimal timing of the reconstruction of the scar contracture in the infant was at least 6 months after the burn injury when the scar tissue activity settles down. Earlier surgical intervention will cause post operative recontracture. The donor site for the skin graft were selected in the groin area and non-weight bearing portion of the sole, depending upon graft size needed.
For prevention it is necessary that the parents and society learn to recognize the situations under which these infant burns occur.