trauma

Trauma

Trauma patients are people from all age groups, geographic areas, and socioeconomic classes: the elderly woman who falls and breaks her hip, the middle-aged pedestrian who is hit by a car while walking his dog on a familiar road or struck by lightning on the golf course, the adolescent with a gunshot wound or a neck injury from diving, the young adult metal worker or farm worker whose hand is injured in heavy machinery, or the child burned in a fire -- these people sustain traumatic injuries

The main purpose of this issue is to familiarize persons in the alcohol and other drug (AOD) treatment field with hospitalized trauma patients, including the types of injury they sustain, the physical and psychological effects of these injuries, and the typical course of treatment for trauma patients—from acute emergency treatment in hospitals and trauma centers through rehabilitation and return to the community.

The purpose of this issue is to familiarize persons in the AOD treatment field with hospitalized trauma patients, including the types of injury they sustain, the physical and psychological effects of these injuries, and the typical course of treatment for trauma patients.

A variety of factors increase the likelihood that a person will sustain a traumatic injury, and this article presents a model for conceptualizing these factors and their relation to injury. In this view, a traumatic injury is seen not as an "accident" but as a condition resulting from the interaction of many factors. An assumption of this view of injury as a public health problem is that, like heart disease, it can to a large extent be prevented when risk factors are reduced.

This report does not attempt to provide a comprehensive description of traumatic injuries and their treatment. Only the major types of traumatic injury are described in detail, while others are highlighted. Particular points covered about each type of traumatic injury include its major causes, its incidence in the general population, and the proportion of patients for whom AOD use and dependence contribute to the injury.

It is hoped that when reading this chapter, persons in the AOD treatment field begin to consider this diverse patient population in terms of identifying and treating the AOD-abusing and -dependent individual. This population is similar to other AOD treatment populations with co-morbidity conditions, such as persons with dual diagnoses (mental illness and AOD use disorders) or with serious, chronic medical conditions. Both conditions must be treated for the overall prognosis to improve. It is hoped that models or strategies for working with this patient group will suggest themselves to readers.

 

Traumatic injury has been recognized as a leading public health problem, and policymakers at all levels have attempted to implement injury-prevention measures. As discussed and will be addressed in more detail later in this report, alcohol-and-other- drug use plays a major role in traumatic injury. Persons with untreated AOD problems who have sustained one traumatic injury are at increased risk of re-injury. Because of the growing emphasis on injury prevention, it is likely that hospitalized trauma patients will come increasingly to the attention of the AOD treatment field

To be continued next week with different views of trauma definition ,type and management

DR FIRAS ALKURDI
EMTM, MBBS.