[The role of urinary tract infections in burn patients]

Patients with burns are predisposed to a variety of infectious complications, urinary tract infections inclusive. It is the aim of the study to assay the incidence rate, etiology and antibacterial sensitivity of the leading pathogens causing bacteriuria in burnt patients, and compare them with the respective characteristics of the pathogens causing wound infection in the same contingent of patients, and urinary tract infection in uro-nephrological patients. Over a five-year period, a total of 2452 urines and 4236 wound exudates from 963 patients with burns, and 8800 urines from 2908 uro-nephrological patients are studied. In 35.4 per cent of patients positivation of 29.2 per cent of the urines being examined is noted. The major causing agents producing bacteriuria in burns--E. coli (19.2%) and Proteus mirabilis (13.9%)--are similar to the ones found in uro-nephrological patients, and differ from the causing agents of wound infection (the isolates concur in 16.7 per cent of the cases only). The inference is reached that strict monitoring of burnt patients is absolutely necessary because they run a high risk of urinary infection development, most frequently caused by multiresistant hospital strains, worsening the prognosis of either of the conditions. Monotherapy prescription with broad-spectrum antibacterial agents, based on the sensitivity of isolates in vitro, is strongly recommended.