The prevalence of HIV infection among burn patients in a burns unit in Malawi and its influence on outcome.
Burns
; 29(1): 55-60, 2003 Feb.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-12543046
ABSTRACT
In a 1 year study, 342 patients admitted to the Burns Unit at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QECH), Blantyre, Malawi underwent a voluntary HIV test. Forty (11.7%) tested HIV positive of those aged above 15 years, 31% (34 out of 112) were HIV positive, whilst 3% (6 of 231) aged under 15 were HIV positive of whom the majority were in those aged under 5 years (5 of 125, 4%). Patients who were HIV positive had an increased risk of death (P=0.04) which was mainly due to sepsis, but those HIV patients, who did not develop infection or recovered from an episode of sepsis, had similar hospital stay, need for skin grafting and graft take as nonHIV patients. There was no difference in pathogens cultured from wound swabs taken from HIV positive and negative patients. HIV positive patients had significantly lower CD4 counts as compared to HIV negative patients (mean 383mm3 (S.D. 320) and 937mm3 (S.D. 497), respectively). However, low CD4 counts were also found in the HIV negative patients (mean 901, range 131-1964) and 24% had CD4 <500/mm3. Both HIV status and the total body surface area (TBSA) burned were independent predictors of CD4 count. TBSA was an independent risk factor for death (odds ratio 1.3; 95% CI 1.1, 1.4). In patients with TBSA burns of over 30%, mortality approached 100% irrespective of HIV status, but in patients with burns of 11-20% TBSA and who were HIV positive have a mortality of 25% compared to 12% in HIV negative patients; for 21-30% TBSA burns mortality was 100% compared to 50% for HIV positive and HIV negative patients, respectively.
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Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Burns
/
HIV Infections
Type of study:
Observational_studies
/
Prevalence_studies
/
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Limits:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Child
/
Child, preschool
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Country/Region as subject:
Africa
Language:
En
Journal:
Burns
Year:
2003
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Malawi