The relationship between the application time and type of trauma and morbidity and mortality of patients applied to the emergency servicedue to thoracic trauma

Aim: In this study, analysis of the patients with thoracic trauma was conducted and the relationship between morbidity/mortality rates and the duration of the admittance to emergency service/type of the trauma of the patients was studied. Thereby, the characteristics of the trauma and the results of such patients were aimed to be reflected on a local scale. On the other hand, the prediction of new potential arguments in the management and also how the fastest and the most effective optimal treatment strategy would be conducted in such kind of patients were intended. Material and Methods: A total of 248 patients, admitted/referred to the emergency unit of "Turkish Government Ministry of Health-Recep Tayyip Erdogan University Education and Research Hospital" with the cause of thoracic trauma. The patients' charts of anamnesis, laboratory findings, imaging methods, treatment and follow-up schedule were reviewed and age, gender, ethiology of trauma, period and the type of admittance, characteristics of the trauma, associated injuries, treatment modalities, complications and period of hospitalization were analyzed and the relationships between the morbidty and mortality were examined. Results: The average of admittance to the emergency unit was 6,5 hours. Of the patients, 30,2 % had pneumothorax, 23,8 % hemothorax and %13,3 hemopneumothorax. Conservative methods were conducted in 70,4 % of the patients whereas 58 (23,3 %) underwent tube thoracostomy and 3 (1,2 %) underwent urgent major thorax surgery. Higher number of costa fracture was related with higher ages in a statistically manner (p<0,01). Also, the average of hospital stay was statistically longer (p<0,05) in patients with higher number of costa fracture compared with the lower ones. Patients who died were determined to be admmitted to the emergency unit under the period of 25 minutes whereas there was no statistically siginifanct difference between the survivors and the deaths in terms of admittance period (p>0,05). Conclusion: Relataed with the advences of oppurtunities and celerity in terms of admittance to the health services, the contingence of early diagnosis and also the intervention of the patients with thoracic trauma can be concluded to be ameliorated. During the evaluation of such patients, the information of the probability of the relation between the form of trauma exposed and regional characteristics may contribute the diagnostic and therapeutic process. We can conclude that, the reasonable admittance to the emergency services and also relatingly the early intervention can be attributable with lower morbidity rates, despite a very small reflection of a small study group as in our study.