Antibiotic therapy and infection complications in paediatric burn injuries

Abstract

Background: Each year, nearly 1% of population suffers from burn injuries. The main cause of complications and death after thermal injury is infections. Excessive use of antibiotics affects however the children treated for burns and can have negative effects. Therefore, specifying the recommendations for antibiotic therapy in patients after thermal injury seems to be of importance. Materials and methods: An evaluation of 310 paediatric patients hospitalised for burn injuries was performed. In the first part of evaluation, a retrospective analysis of treatment with particular focus on infection complications and administered antibiotics was performed. This was followed by a prospective evaluation of effectiveness of the principles of antibiotic therapy specified at the earlier stage. Results: In 2010-2016, an antibiotic was systemically administered to 53.4% of children treated for thermal injury, provided that in 87.1% of cases it was introduced as a prophylactic measure. Infection of a burn wound was recorded in 4.7% of cases. The most frequently isolated bacterium (57.1%) was Staphylococcus aureus MSSA. Supply of antibiotics failed to reduce the number of infection complications or burn wound infections. The studies formed the basis for specification of the internal antibiotic therapy criteria, effectiveness of which was then evaluated. In 2017, an antibiotic was administered to 37.1% of patients. Reducing antibiotic therapy did not increase the risk of infection complications or frequency of wound infections. Conclusion: Routine antibiotic prophylaxis in burn injuries has no effect on the risk of infection complications and does not reduce the treatment time. It should be limited to perioperative prophylaxis in the case of skin grafts and to the patients with progressing symptoms of burn disease or with concomitant infections.