ENGINE BLOCK BURNS - DUPUYTREN 4TH-DEGREE, 5TH-DEGREE, AND 6TH-DEGREEBURNS

We recently treated two patients with engine block-muffler contact bur ns and greatly underestimated the devastating injuries to bone, deep f ascia, and muscle. As a result, each patient required multiple procedu res to close their burn wounds. Ten-year data from the University of W ashington Burn Unit confirmed our observation that these burns tend to be considerably deeper than suspected. Eighteen patients with contact burns from engine parts were identified from 1980 through 1990. Nine (50%) of these were initially recognized to be fourth-degree and five (28%) were third-degree thermal injuries, showing that these are deep burns. Eight patients required fascial excisions and four required deb ridement of devascularized bone. The mean burn size was only 6% total body surface area; however, the patients with fourth-degree burns had an average graft take of only 56% and required a mean hospital stay of 44 days. Patients with third-degree burns also had suboptimal graft t ake and some required prolonged hospitalization. Thirty-six percent of patients required flaps either as the initial procedure or as a secon d procedure following an autograft. The four patients with partial-thi ckness burns healed without surgery and their average length of hospit al stay was 3 days. Of the entire group, only four healed without surg ery and only five healed with a single operation. Our 10-year data ind icate that engine block contact burns are usually small, but most are deceptively deep, involving tendon, muscle, or bone. If the burn appea rs full thickness, suspicion must be very high at the initial surgical procedure that there is deep tissue destruction. We propose that burn s from engine block or muffler contact are the fourth, fifth, and sixt h-degree injuries described by Dupuytren in 1832. They behave like and should be handled more like electrical burns than other contact injur ies.