Word: patients
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...recently as the 1970s, a middle-aged patient with 40% of his body burned had a 1-in-2 chance of survival if his respiratory system had escaped damage. Today someone who has as much as 70% of his body burned can expect the same odds. And the average hospital stay for a severely burned patient is considerably less than the old rule of thumb, which was one day for every 1% of the body burned...
When the skin suffers a deep third-degree burn, two major regulatory systems go awry. The body loses its ability to control its temperature, causing burn patients to shiver even in temperatures as high as 75[degrees]F. Consequently, burn-unit rooms are often kept around 90[degrees]F, and a burn team's first priority is to warm the patients with heated fluids or heat shields suspended above the patient...
...Himel snaps some pictures of the patient's chest and the right side of her face. He is especially concerned about the patient's nose and right ear. "It's likely that she will lose that ear and have to have another one constructed for her next spring," he says...
...provides an effective barrier against infection, the immune system goes into overdrive to ward off invading germs. It floods the injured areas with blood and plasma carrying immune cells, which cause extensive inflammation and swelling. In some cases the swelling is severe enough to interfere with breathing, and the patient must be put on a ventilator...
Even when a patient is conscious, though, the burn team must focus first not on painkillers but on stabilizing the blood pressure. The New York team accomplishes this by pumping as much as 8 gal. of a salt fluid into his veins in the first 24 hours of treatment, a process that can cause the patient temporarily to gain as much...