Effect of growth hormone therapy in burn patients on conservative treatment

Evaluation of growth hormone therapy in burns is limited and none is report ed from developing countries where burns still carry high mortality. We ana lysed serial observations on the clinical and biochemical profiles in 13 pa tients with second and third degree burns who received recombinant human gr owth hormone (rhGH) (0.5 IU/kg body wt) for 2 weeks in addition to standard conservative treatment and in 9 patients who were managed with standard co nservative treatment only. The two groups of patients had burns, comparable in extent and severity. Additional rhGH treatment resulted in improved wou nd healing (p < 0.001), delayed separation of eschars (p < 0.01), increase in haemoglobin (p < 0.05), serum albumin (p < 0.01), calcium (p < 0.05), ph osphorus (p < 0.001), glomerular filtration rate (p < 0.05) and 7 fold elev ation in IGF-1. Also, a reduction in weight loss (p < 0.01), nitrogen produ ction rate (p < 0.05), catabolic index (p < 0.01), duration of sepsis (p < 0.01) and hospital stay by 40% (p < 0.01) was noted with rhGH therapy. Tran sient hypercalcemia (3 patients), albuminuria (2 patients) and elevated blo od glucose tone patient) were noted in the rhGH treated group not necessita ting any specific therapy. Mortality in rhGH treatment group was 8.3% compa red to 44.5% in the "no rhGH" treatment group. These observations suggest s ignificant benefits of short term rhGH treatment in burn patients on conser vative management. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd for ISBI. All rights reser ved.