Risk factors:
(1) age of the patient - pediatric or age > 60 years
(2) presence of significant comorbid disease (diabetes mellitus, immunodeficiency, other)
(3) poor perfusion of burn site
(4) extensive burn (> 30% of body surface area)
(5) full-thickness (third degree) burn
(6) moist wound
(7) acidosis
(8) high wound density of bacteria (> 100,000 per gram of tissue)
(9) micro-organism with a pathogenic factor (motility, toxin, invasive factors)
(10) micro-organism resistant to antibiotics
where:
• I will use < 12 years to indicate a pediatric patient at risk.
• I will use a full thickness burn > 5% BSA as the operational risk factor.
total number of risk factors =
= SUM(number of factors present)
