Medicine Technology 🌱 Environment Space Energy Physics Engineering Social Science Earth Science Science
Medicine 2014-03-14

Greater risk for surgical intervention, longer hospital stays in obese trauma patients

Obese orthopedic trauma patients had lower injury severity scores
NEW ORLEANS--Approximately one-third of the American population is obese and the number is rising, as is the number of obese individuals involved in high-energy accidents with multiple injuries.

In the new study, "The Relationship of Obesity to Increasing Health Care Burden in the Setting of Orthopedic Polytrauma," presented today at the 2014 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), researchers identified 301 patients with multiple traumatic injuries (polytrauma) who had orthopaedic injuries requiring intensive care unit (ICU) admission at a major trauma hospital between 2006 and 2011.

Patients with a truncal body mass index (TBMI) END