Background
The blunt chest injuries are the most important problems in civil practice especially due to the increasing incidence of the traffic accident. But early acute grading of the severity of chest injuries is known to be difficult. Method: A prospective investigation was performed on 57 blunt chest trauma patients admitted to Emergency Department of Asan Medical Center during March 2003. In all patients, the correlations between oxygen saturation (SpO2), respiratory rate, thoracic Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS), and Injury Severity Scale (ISS) were investigated. Results: The difference of thoracic AIS and ISS between low SpO2 group (SpO2< 95%) group and normal SpO2 group (SpO2≥ 95% group) was statistically significant (P<0.05). The difference of thoracic AIS between abnormal respiratory rate group (< 16 breaths/min. or > 24 breaths/min.) and normal respiratory rate group (16-24 breaths/min.) was statistically significant (P<0.05), but difference of ISS was not statistically significant (P=0.07). Abnormal respiratory rate group had lower oxygen saturation compared with normal respiratory rate group in chest trauma patients (P< 0.05). Conclusion: We conclude that oxygen saturation measured by pulse oximetry and respiratory rate can be used as a triage tool for severity grading of chest injuries at the emergency department. But we recommend oxygen saturation measured by pulse oximetry rather than respiratory rate as a triage tool because of its accuracy, simplicity and rapidity in emergency department.
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