Introduction: |
The ongoing pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV2) has essentially placed the world into an unparalleled strain of public health demand and inadequacy of health essential resources. This mandated special regulatory strategies across various disciplines including burn.

Method:
The authors aim to describe the overall epidemiological experience of the US-based regional burn center, functioning in the premises of a metropolitan area that experienced the rapid spread of pandemic. This retrospective observational study reviewed and compared emergency department visits and burn center admissions from 1st January 2020 to 31st August in years 2020, 2019 and 2018. Using the burn registry database & paper admission logs, de-identified data pertaining to the admitted patients were collected and descriptive statistics were utilized for comparison. To further analyze potential disparities, sociodemographic status (SES) was defined for each patient using zip code stratified data from census and categorized using below poverty level percentage – upper <19%, middle 19-27.7%, and lower >27.7%.

Results:
A total of 272 admissions were noted at our burn center from January to August 2020 that is 24% higher than the previous year for a similar month duration (272 vs 220 vs 245). The median age for burn admission in 2020 was younger 41.25 vs 47.5(2019) vs 48(2020). Males contributed a little less than the previous 2 years. Interestingly, the admission threshold based on total burn surface area was lower for this current year than the previous 2 years with questionable significance. People residing in higher socio-economic areas had higher admissions. While comparing the proportion of patients admitted at our burn center from total emergency room (ED) visits, a higher percentage of patients were admitted in 2020 comparatively. Regarding the etiology, there was a higher incidence of flame and contact burns during the COVID pandemic than in previous years.

Conclusions:
Interestingly, the burn center had a higher number of admissions & flame injuries despite lower burn injury-related emergency visits. This could be assigned to the higher severity of the injuries and a more serious presentation. Despite having higher cases and ongoing spread of COVID-19, infection rates were effectively controlled within the organization by utilizing the center-based regulatory measures. At the same time, burn-injured patients were managed adequately with or without COVID-19 infection.