December 14, 2019 (ScienceDirect)
A questionnaire was developed for 5 of the major burn units in the United Kingdom to assess current practice and determine if there were any existing local and national trends in the use of flu vaccination on burn patients.
A secondary goal was to review existing evidence in literature on this subject, if any.
Results found that no local respondents were aware of any existing guidelines. External units also had not used any sort of a guideline, or set of guidelines, for flu vaccinations in burn patients. Furthermore, n review of literature discovered no studies that investigated the use of flu vaccination in burn patients.
To resolve this, researchers have proposed a guideline that could aid in the decision to give flu vaccinations to patients with significant burns on the basis of a number of factors such as age, percent of total body surface area and comorbidity.
Researchers also stress that such a recommendation of prescribing a flu vaccine to a burn patient should be considered on an individual basis.
Read more about giving flu shots to high risk burn patients here. (Not open access)