When we speak of polytraumatized child or severe pediatric trauma we mean the situation of body damage resulting from an accident in which a child is involved and which affects various organs or systems, or even just one, with sufficient magnitude to endanger his or her life. Its importance lies in the fact that it is the most frequent cause of death in children over one year of age, it is associated with permanent sequelae and it is a problem that affects previously healthy children more frequently.
The initial care of a polytraumatized child implies the existence of a multidisciplinary team specifically trained in the management of multiple simultaneous injuries in the child. It is important to understand that the child’s physiological characteristics and response to aggression are different from those of an adult and that this conditions medical action.
International Seminar on Child Fractures
Health professionals who may be faced with cases of polytraumatized children must be in constant training to be able to successfully treat this type of patient. For this reason, at the XVIII International Seminar on Child Fractures held in Barcelona at the end of October, I gave a lecture on initial care and damage control in the polytraumatized child.
In the conference I explained the difference in the management of skeletal and spinal injuries when these are accompanied by injuries to other organs or systems and how the initial approach is not the immediate and definitive solution of a specific fracture but damage control to save the patient’s life.
We also address this issue in all training courses in AITP (Initial Pediatric Trauma Care) that are made in the Vall d’Hebron Hospital, in which I participate as a teacher and where we teach the management of such patients and include practices with dolls, surgical workshops with animals and integration practices with children simulators made up as if they had had an accident.