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Transfer, Telemedicine and Transportation in Pre-hospital Burn Management

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Abstract

A significant proportion of burn injuries occur in rural or remote locations without immediate access to a burn centre. As a result, most thermally injured patients are initially assessed and triaged at a pre-hospital healthcare facility before consideration of transfer to a dedicated burn centre. However, not all burn-injured patients require urgent transfer to a burn centre. Ensuring that patients are appropriately transferred and transported from the pre-hospital setting to the burn centre can significantly impact the overall burn care. This chapter reviews (1) the transfer of thermally injured patients from the pre-hospital setting, (2) the role of telemedicine and technology in the pre-hospital management of burn injuries and (3) the determination of the most appropriate method of transportation for thermally injured patients.

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The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the authorship and publication of this article. There are no sources of financial support to disclose regarding this article.

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Austin, R.E. (2020). Transfer, Telemedicine and Transportation in Pre-hospital Burn Management. In: Jeschke, M., Kamolz, LP., Sjöberg, F., Wolf, S. (eds) Handbook of Burns Volume 1. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18940-2_12

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