Overview
Burns are a type of injury that happens when something — usually something hot — damages tissues of your body. They’re more severe when they’re deeper and cover a larger part of your body’s surface area.
Burns are extremely common and usually unintentional. Worldwide, about 10 million people experience burns, and about 180,000 die from them each year. In the U.S., about 486,000 people receive medical care for burns each year.
Types of burns
There are five types of burns:
- Thermal burns (hot or cold). These involve cell damage from extreme temperatures.
- Electrical burns. These happen when electrical energy overloads your cells. Electricity also generates heat and causes thermal damage.
- Friction burns. These burns happen when something rubs against your body hard enough to generate heat. The amount of force needed for these burns usually causes other types of damage, too.
- Radiation burns. This happens when different forms of radiation damage your cells, which then break down and die.
- Chemical burns. These happen when chemicals, usually ones that are acidic (acids) or alkaline (bases), try to react with your cells and destroy them.
Experts determine how severe a burn is partly by how deep it goes. The older system of rating burns by degrees is no longer in widespread use. Instead, experts use the following system:
- Superficial (similar to first-degree). These only damage the epidermis, the top layer of skin. These are minor and always self-treatable.
- Partial-thickness (similar to second-degree). These go deeper, damaging the outer two layers of your skin. They can blister, cause color or texture changes more than just simple redness and be painful.
- Full-thickness (similar to third-degree). These burns go through all skin layers and can reach all the way to the fatty tissue underneath the dermis. Full-thickness burns destroy nerve endings, so they don’t hurt.
Burns can extend even deeper and damage muscles, nerves, bones and other deep tissues. These aren’t as common, and experts sometimes call these fourth-degree burns.
Symptoms
When to see a doctor
Complications
- High blood pressure.
- Diabetes.
- Heart failure.
- Some types of heart valve disease.
Prevention
- Control high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes.
- Don't smoke or use tobacco.
- Eat a diet that's low in salt and saturated fat.
- Exercise at least 30 minutes a day on most days of the week unless your health care team says not to.
- Get good sleep. Adults should aim for 7 to 9 hours daily.
- Maintain a healthy weight.
- Reduce and manage stress.
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