Factors affecting mortality and morbidity in thoracic trauma

Trauma is the leading cause of death in the first four decates. Thoracic trauma is the cause of 25% death directly and other 25% concomitantly. Rapid and correct first aid decreases the thoracic trauma mortality up to 30%. We evaluate treatment, scoring systems, factors affecting morbidity and mortality in the thoracic trauma patients who were treated in our department.A retrospective evaluationwas performed on 1490 thoracic trauma patients who were treated in the Dicle university thoracic surgery department between June 2003 and November 2009. We evaluated thoracic trauma cases with respect to age, sex, etiologic causes, thoracic pathology, extrathoracic pathology, admitting complete blood counting, admitting tension arterial, time interval from trauma to hospital admitting, chronic diseases, treatment tecniques, chest tube drainage, mechanic ventilation, blood transfusion, intensive care unit staying, morbidities, mortalities and hospital staying time. Injury scales of ISS and NISS were both estimated for all patients. At last, the factors affecting morbidity and mortality were evaluated.Statistics were studied by student-t and chi-square tests. We used SPSS for Windows 10.0 programme for statistical analysis.Morbidity was seen in 298 (%20) patients and mortality was seen 61 (%4.09) patients in our study.As conclusion; we achieved that; elder age, hig ISS and NISS points, flail chest, rib fractures more than 3, bilaterally pleural pathologies, severe lung contusion, admitting time anemia, high white blood cell counting, high levels of chest tube drainage ( initial and total), heart disease, concomitant injuries (esp. cranial injuries) were the factors which affect morbidity and mortality in the thoracic trauma. Time interval between trauma and hospital, intensive care staying time and hospital staying time were no affective factors over mortality.