Orthopedic Injuries In The Victims Of The Earthquake Of Bam

摘要

Objective: To determine the prevalence of the various orthopedic injuries in the earthquake victims of Bam on 26/12/2003 referred to the emergency rooms of the hospitals of the Shaheed Beheshti University of Medical Sciences Material and methods: It was an observational, descriptive case series study and the data collection was via observation and interview. All of the victims of the earthquake of Bam referred directly from the site of earthquake to the emergency rooms of the hospitals of the Shaheed Beheshti University of Medical Sciences and were entered to this study on a census basis. The prevalence of various orthopedic injuries including fractures, dislocations and soft tissue injury were determined by clinical examination, X-ray and CT scan when necessary. Results: The victims' age ranged from 1.5 to 80 years, with a mean of 30.2 years. 76.9% of the victims suffered from one or more sort of orthopedic injuries. 9.6% had solely soft tissue injury and 57.6% had fracture or dislocation without any soft tissue injury. Also 9.6% of the victims suffered from both bone fracture and soft tissue injury. The most common injuries were: pelvic fracture (25%), lower leg fractures (18.2%), and compartment syndrome (12.5%). Conclusion: Since a remarkable percentage of the earthquake victims suffered from a kind of orthopedic injury, particularly pelvic and lower leg fractures and also compartment syndrome, special attention has to be focused on dealing with these injuries in future similar catastrophes. Introduction The death toll of the devastating earthquake of Bam on 26/12/2003 is estimated at 40,000 and also many people were injured. Since a remarkable number of victims suffered from orthopedic injuries, defining the sort of these injuries can greatly help the health professionals to determine the therapeutic primaries in future such catastrophes and to take effective measures for the treatment of the victims. As a noticeable number of the victims were referred directly from the site of earthquake to the emergency rooms of the hospitals of the Shaheed Beheshti University of Medical Sciences including Imam Hossein Medical Centre, Akhtar Medical Centre and Taleghani Medical Centre, by evaluation of these victims we can get an approximate estimation of the prevalence of various orthopedic injuries in the victims referred to the emergency rooms. For the mentioned reason we performed this study in order to determine the prevalence of various orthopedic injuries including fractures, dislocations and soft tissue injury in the victims of the earthquake of Bam referred to the emergency rooms of the hospitals of Shaheed Beheshti University of Medical Sciences.In previous studies regarding the earthquake-related injuries, the orthopedic injuries such as pelvic fracture, compartment syndrome and long bone fractures had a remarkable prevalence (1,2,3,4,5). In the earthquake of Marmara in 1999, according to a study conducted in Kartal Hospital, extremities fractures and pelvic and spine injuries were reported to be 16.8% and 16.1% respectively (1). In the earthquake of Loma Prieta in 1989, the soft tissue injuries and different fractures were the most common problems amongst the victims (2). In the earthquake of Tangshan in China which had the most casualties in the last century, pelvic fracture and compartment syndromes were the most common orthopedic problems (3). In the earthquake of Kobe-Osaka in 1995 in Japan, vertebral and pelvic fractures were the most common problems (4). Our objective in this study was to determine the prevalence of various orthopedic injuries in the earthquake victims referred to the emergency rooms of the hospitals of Shaheed Beheshti University of Medical Sciences including Imam Hossein Medical Centre, Akhtar Medical Centre and Taleghani Medical Centre. Materials and Methods It was an observational, descriptive case series study and the data collection was via observation and interview. All of the victims of the ear