Introduction : Injuries due to burn are the injuries that require intensive medical care at hospital level. Patients facing such life-threatening incidents mostly pass away at the end of these processes.

Objective : The aim of our study was to introduce the criteria effecting the deaths due to burn traumas and to categorize them according to their vital risks.
Materials and Method : At the Department of Emergency Surgery of Istanbul Medical Faculty, we examined 284 cases that were under treatment at burn intensive care units between the years 2004 and 2010 in terms of their sociodemographic characteristics, burn criteria and treatment problems. Sociodemographic characteristics and factors that in uence each patient’s outcome were analyzed with mean% ratio and chi-square test; moreover, the impact of patients’ features on outcomes were presented statistically.

Results : In our study, 209 (73.6%) were males, 75 (26.4%) were females. We found that the mean age was 19.95 20.38 years, the mean burn percentage was 33.18 23.82%, the mean length of stay at hospital was 15.95 15.3 days. Among

the reasons of burn, hot water burn ranks first with 123 cases (43.3%), followed by fire burn and electricity burn, respectively. of the cases, 68.3% (n=194) had 1st and 2nd degree burn; 25.7% (n=73) of them had 2rd and 3rd degree burn. While 151 of cases (53.2%) were discharged from hospital with improved condition, 113 (39.8%) died during their treatment period. We found that 79.6% (n=90) of the cases, who died during their treatment period, were males and 67.1% (n=49) had 2nd and 3rd degree burn. Children group accounted for 54.1% (n=153) of all cases. There was a statistical difference found between children and adult groups in that less number of deaths occurred as a result in children group, comparing to adult group (p<0, 005). Also, we found a statistical significance between the children and adult groups in that 81.7% (n=125) of children group were with 1st and 2nd degree burn and 53.1% of adult group (n=69) were with 1st and 2nd degree burn (p<0, 000). We found that 88.4% of cases with more than 20% of 2nd and 3rd degree burn and 75% of them aged 65 and older died during their treatment period. We determined that all of the cases with burn percentage of 65% or over died.

Discussion : Burn is a trauma, which threatens burned person’s life and results in death. It was reported that 20% of burn cases were treated by being admitted to the hospital. The patient’s age, burn percentage and degree of burn are most signi cant factors that affect mortality and morbidity in burns.