Work-Related Burn Injuries Hospitalized in US Burn Centers: 2002 to 2011

OBJECTIVE:To develop a comprehensive definition to identify work-related burns in the National Burn Repository (NBR) based on multiple fields and describes injuries by occupation. METHODS:The NBR, which is an inpatient dataset, was used to compare type and severity of burn injuries by occupation. RESULTS:Using the definition developed for this analysis, 22,969 burn injuries were identified as work-related. In contrast, the single work-related field intended to capture occupational injuries only captured 4696 cases. The highest numbers of burns were observed in construction/extraction, food preparation, and durable goods production occupations. Occupations with a mean total body surface area (TBSA) burned greater than 10% include transportation and material-moving, architecture and engineering, and arts/design/entertainment/sports/media occupations. CONCLUSIONS:The NBR dataset should be further utilized for occupational burn injury investigations and multiple fields should be considered for case ascertainment.