Effects of socioeconomic status on outcomes in <15% TBSA pediatric burn injuries: a single-institution retrospective study

Background Pediatric burn injuries pose significant health concerns and ranks fifth globally in common non-fatal injuries. Current evidence associates lower socioeconomic status (SES) with higher incidence of burn injury, greater TBSA, need for admission, and greater involvement of child protective services. There is a paucity of Canadian data on the topic and effects of indices of deprivation on outcomes have not been investigated extensively. Methods A retrospective single-centre study was carried out to examine effects of SES and Ontario Marginalization Index (OMI) on pediatric burn patient outcomes. One-way ANOVA was used for continuous dependent variables (i.e. TBSA, length of stay with post-hoc Bonferroni correction and Pearson chi-square analysis was done for categorical variables (i.e. CAS involvement, need for OR, need for admission). P-value of 0.05 was set a priori to determine statistical significance. Results No differences in outcomes were found between the four quartiles of SES categories. Analysis of the OMI for Material Resources, Racialized and Newcomer Populations, Age and Labour Force, and Household and Dwellings produced statistically significant findings. Patients with a higher degree of marginalization for most indices measured tended greater TBSA, greater time to surgery, and greater length of stay. An unexpected finding was that patients with the lowest Age and Labour Force deprivation index were likely to have greater TBSA. Conclusion Identifying various social determinants of health on pediatric burn patients remains a challenging obstacle. While this study found no differences in patient outcomes based on income alone, examination of the granularity in deprivation provided notable differences. These effects can be further clarified with a cross-provincial nation population-based study.