Hot Water Can Hurt You
How to keep your family safe from scald burns
A hospital scrapbook—Lily reminisces with her mother, Abigail Pasterski of Topton (center) and grandmother (“Mimi”), Mary Lou Kolonyi. The Lehigh Valley Hospital burn team used artificial skin to cover Lily’s wounds, ease the pain and minimize scarring. “We never thought of the Burn Center until we needed it,” says her grateful mother.
Treating Burns of
Every Degree
If you suffer a burn and come to the Lehigh Valley Hospital emergency room, a specialized team is on-hand to analyze the severity of the injury. Severely burned patients are admitted to the Regional Burn Center. But the hospital also operates an outpatient Burn Recovery Center, where you have access to the same type of specialty caregivers.
She wanted to give her “Mimi” a hug. But when 7-year-old Lily ran up and threw her arms around her grandmother’s waist, she didn’t realize Mimi was draining a pot of just-cooked pasta. “When I bumped into her, some of the boiling water splashed on me,” Lily says.
Lily suffered burns to her right arm, hand, chest and neck. Fortunately, her family promptly did all the right things: Mimi took off the child’s wet dress, immersed her arm and hand in a pot of cool water and wrapped her injuries with a dish towel, and Lily’s aunt called 9-1-1. After treatment by Lehigh Valley Hospital’s burn team, Lily made a full recovery. Not all children are as lucky. Scalds are the leading cause of accidental death in the home for children up to age 4, and account for 40 percent of children’s burn injuries up to age 14. Many survivors carry permanent scars.
“If a scald burn covers more than the surface of half a child’s arm, seek immediate care at an emergency room or regional burn center,” says burn surgeon Sigrid Blome-Eberwein, M.D., of Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network. Burns on the face or neck can cause swelling that affects breathing. And burns over a large area of the body (10 percent or more in children, 15 percent or more in adults) can lead to infection, fluid loss and shock.
“Immediate care also is important because burns can actually become deeper over time and more serious to treat,” says Scott Rice, M.D., a pediatrician at the hospital. How can you help prevent scald injuries in your home?
- Keep toddlers out of the kitchen when you’re cooking.
- Cook on the back burners.
- Put a childproof guard on the front of your stove to keep curious hands from reaching up.
- If you have a toddler, don’t use tablecloths— they can be pulled, spilling hot drinks.
- Don’t give hot liquids to a child. “Be especially concerned with microwavable cups of noodles or soup,” Blome-Eberwein says. “Because the Styrofoam cup stays cool, children misjudge how hot the food is and may panic and spill it on themselves.”
- Set your hot water heater no higher than 120 degrees Fahrenheit. If you can’t change the water heater temperature, install temperature-control valves on the bathtub and shower faucets. “A child’s wandering hands can quickly turn a faucet toward hot,” Rice says. Older people also can get in trouble if they slip in the shower and grab at the faucet.
Want to Know More about burn first aid? Call 610-402-CARE.
Published from Healthy You Magazine, September-October 2008
This page last updated 8/24/08 08:16 AM
