Resource use in pediatric blunt and penetrating trauma

Trauma is one of the leading causes of pediatric morbidity and mortality with significant patient and economic impacts that necessitate constant study. Significant differences in outcomes and resource use exist between blunt and penetrating mechanisms.

The National Trauma Data Bank was analyzed for patients aged 0-18 y with International Classification of Diseases, 9th Revision injury codes for blunt and penetrating trauma from 2007-2012. Demographic information, causes, treatments, complications, and outcomes were assessed.

A total of 748,347 pediatric trauma patients were assessed. Blunt trauma was identified as the cause in 601,898 (80.43%) patients compared with 55,597 (7.4%) patients with penetrating trauma. Blunt trauma patients were younger on average and more likely to be female. Despite having a slightly higher mean injury severity scores, blunt trauma patients had shorter length of stay in the hospital (2.9 versus 4.3 d, P < 0.001), fewer complications (34.8% versus 38.6%, P < 0.001), and a much lower mortality rate (1.3% versus 7.1%, P < 0.001). Blunt trauma patients were more likely to undergo computed tomography scanning but less likely to receive transfusions (1.79% versus 5.5%, P < 0.001) and to undergo exploratory laparotomy (0.9% versus 9.4%, P < 0.001) and thoracotomy (0.07% versus 1.7%, P < 0.001). Variations in outcome and resource use were also noted by age.

Compared with penetrating trauma, blunt trauma is more common and patients have shorter length of stay, less complications, lower mortality, and are less likely to need operative intervention or blood transfusion. Resource use also varied by age.