OOP Re: SC - Re: nasty steam/hot water burns (another burn story)

[RichSCA at aol.com]

Not to have this turn into ...."Your best burn story", but got to tell this 
one.

When my aunt was around 5 years old (around 1928) my grandparents lived in 
upper New York.  It was wintertime and Celia was standing on something, 
reaching for something, around the wood burning cooking stove.  She had very 
long hair which caught on fire. It burned her head, neck and down one arm to 
the elbow. My grandmother began to scream and my grandfather ran into the 
room.  Now my grandfather is (was) around 5 ft tall with a wooden leg. He 
scooped up Celia and began running to the nearest town (which I have been 
told was miles away). When he could no longer stand her screams, he would 
stick her (almost literally) upside down in the snow until she stopped.  He 
finally reached the town and the doctor told him that there was nothing he 
could do for her, but drug her (to keep her out of pain) until she died.  
They had to pull my Grandfather off of the doctor.  Celia (at that time) was 
his only child.  Another man drove Grandfather and Celia to another (larger) 
town where the doctors there did skin grafts. 

Now this is the neat thing... (well, I think), The doctors took the skin 
grafts from her thighs.  The doctor knew that she would be scarred up, so 
(remember this is 1928) he took the grafts in patterns.  She has hearts and 
circles all around her legs.  He did an excellent job.  The only actually 
scarring that you can see is on her joints (neck and arm pit).  

When I grew up in Arizona where we (kids) would make sun tattoos.  You take a 
piece of paper, cut out a pattern.  Then wet it and stick it on your skin.  
After being outside for a while (or all day), you would remove the paper and 
have a white pattern on your tanned little body.  We always thought it was 
neat that Celia had permanent "sun tattoos'.   

Rayne  
P.S.  I have related this story many times and had a doctor tell me that she 
probably survived bcause Grandfather left with her right away and kept 
sticking her in the snow.  In those days it was common practice to cover 
burns with lard - which brought on more infection than it frequently helped.  
 Remember it is now:  cold water or ice (depending) - NOT butter, oil, cream, 
lard, etc. on burns.  Oh, yes (reference story below) in almost all cases it 
is "leave the clothing on"... when you try to remove it you literally rip the 
skin off with it.


      RichSCA at aol.com wrote:
 > 
 > Sieggy,
 > 
 > I understood what you meant.  I served as a medical corpsman during the
 > Vietnam War.  I lasted just a few weeks in a burn ward before I requested 
to
 > be transferred to the paraplegic ward.
 
 A not-so-pretty story- 
    Several years ago (7 or 8) my kids and I were on our way to an event in
 the foothills of Mt. Rainier, about halfway up (really nice park) We
 were on I-5, fully loaded, near Castle Rock, when a heater hose that ran
 through the passenger compartment just in front of the front passenger
 seat (my old van) blew with no warning. Annie (Rotrude) was in the front
 seat. The water peeled the skin off of her arm and back as she turned
 and tried to get out of her seat- she couldn't get the belt catch to
 release. I can go the rest of my life without hearing screams like that.
 I was in the left lane and had a hard time getting over through traffic,
 but I pulled over and shut off the motor (which stopped the water) and
 hustled her out of the van. She was covered in radiator water, chunks of
 skin and ooze. The coolers were full of fresh ice- no ice water. I
 couldn't remember if you're supposed to take clothes off of a burn
 victim or leave them on, so I draped a clean blanket around her to keep
 the dust and gravel from passing traffic off of her. But then what to
 do? We were in the middle of Downtown Nowhere. But about a half mile up
 the road was a pickup and trailer pulled over. I SPRINTED. They had a
 cell phone and the Advanced Life Support was there in just a few
 minutes. She was in shock but they filled her full of morphine and by
 the time I got to the hospital she was hilarious. 
    Second degree burns over 30%, another 10-15% first degree. They gave us
 drugs and Silvadene cream and sent us home. I spent the next few weeks
 soaking her in ther bathtub, debriding, and re-wrapping. We warned the
 neighbors there would be screams and why. It was not a picnic, but what
 else was there to do? She's my kid.
    She's almost sixteen now, AND NO SCARS. Skin on one arm has a slightly
 different pigment. Her back and the side of her face didn't scar at all.
 Our car insurance paid the bills (it was a freak accident- nothing like
 that in the files anywhere) And I ran up and day-tripped the event (sans
 kids) the next day as I had to be at a meeting. But I'll tell ya,
 dealing with burns is not something I ever want to do again...
 
 'Lainie
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