[Accidents during bathing].

ABSTRACT

Sudden death during bathing accounts for 10 to 15% of all out-of hospital cardiac arrests in Japan. Surveys in Tokyo revealed 1,085 victims of accidents during bathing transported by ambulance from October 1999 to March 2000. 53% of them were cardiac arrest and 25% were those who needed rescue from bath tub because of consciousness disturbance (rescued group). Clinical observation of the rescued group patients indicated they suffered from transient loss of consciousness probably because of elevated body temperature. The current hypothesis of the accidents during bathing is a unique type of heat illness exposed by high water temperature(41-43 degrees C). Geriatric population is vulnerable to the bathing induced heat illness.