Upon admission coagulation and platelet function in patients with thermal and electrical injuries

There has been increased focus on hemostatic potential and function in the initial assessment of the patient with traumatic injuries, that not been extensively studied in patients with burns. We proposed to determine the hemostatic potential of patients with burns upon admission to the emergency department and contrasted their condition with that of healthy controls and patients with other traumatic injuries. In addition we assessed differences due to thermal versus electrical injury and evaluated the effect of burn size.

This is a patient based prospective observational study conducted with delayed consented. Subjects at the highest level of trauma activation upon admission to the ED had a blood sample collected for research purposes and were subsequently consented. Hemostatic potential was measured by rapid thromelastography (r-TEG^®), thrombin generation by calibrated automated thrombogram (CAT) and platelet function by Multiplate^® using five activators. Burn subjects were compared to subjects with other traumatic injuries and controls. Within the burn subjects additional analysis compared mechanism (thermal vs. electrical) and burn size. Values are medians (IQR).

Two hundred and eighty two trauma patients (with burns n=40, 14%) and 27 controls were enrolled. Upon admission, compared to controls, subjects with burns or trauma were hyper-coagulable based on r-TEG and CAT, with increased rates of clot formation and thrombin generation. There were no differences in burns compared to other traumatic injuries. The presence of hyper-coagulation did not appear to be related to the type of burn or the percentage of total body surface area involved. Employing previous defined cut points for R-TEG driven therapeutic interventions burn patients had similar rates of hyper- and hypo-coagulation noted in patients with traumatic injuries.

Upon admission patients with burns are in a hyper-coagulable state similar to that of other trauma patients. Employing demonstrated cut points of hemostatic potential in trauma patients associated with increased risk of poor outcomes demonstrated the incidence in burn patients to be similar, suggesting that these values could be used in the early assessment of the patient with burns to guide treatment interventions.