Manejo del quemado eléctrico en un hospital de tercer nivel

Introduction

Before human life evolved, electricity was in contact with the earth. Electrical injuries are notoriously different from heat burns.

Objective

To determine the differences between high and low voltage injuries in a tertiary hospital in the west of the country.

Material and methods

We performed a descriptive and prospective study in patients presenting to the emergency room of the Hospital Civil de Guadalajara in 2010 with a diagnosis of electrical injury. Patients with high and low voltage injuries were compared. We used the chi-squared test to compare non-parametric variables and Student's t-test to compare parametric variables. A P-value of .05 or less was considered significant.

Results

We included 22 adult patients (19 men and 3 women). There were 8 patients with a high voltage injury and 14 with a low voltage injury. All the patients arrived at the emergency room within 24 hours of the accident. Hospital stay was longer in patients with high voltage injuries (P = .0035). Mortality was associated only with high voltage injuries.

Conclusion

In agreement with previous studies, we found that high voltage injuries conferred greater morbimortality and longer hospital stay than low-voltage injuries. Prevention is the key to reducing the terrible consequences of electrical injury.