ABSTRACT

In recent years, Turkey has become a destination for many Syrian refugees due to the civil war. The objective of our study was to describe the epidemiological characteristics of injuries among refugee children admitted to our tertiary clinic and compare them with Turkish children.

This retrospective study was conducted between December 2013 and December 2017. Syrian refugees were compared with the local population according to the epidemiology of the trauma. Data on age, gender, trauma mechanism, trauma type, first referral center, transfer status, affected body region, affected organ, injury severity score, hospitalization in intensive care unit and pediatric surgery clinic, need for mechanical ventilation and operation, and clinical course were noted.

Four hundred fifteen Turkish citizens and 46 Syrian refugees were enrolled. The median age was similar (8 and 9; respectively) (p=0.815), but there were more boys among the refugees (65.3% and 80.4%; respectively) (p=0.025). The causes of trauma, type of trauma, transfer status, affected body region, need for mechanical ventilation, need for operation, and discharge status were similar between the groups. Lung trauma was more common in refugees than in Turkish patients (21.7% and 9.6%, respectively) (p=0.018). The rate of admission to intensive care unit was higher among Syrian children (p<0.05). There was no significant difference in the length of hospital stay and injury severity score between the groups (p>0.05).

The findings suggest that the injury characteristics were similar between refugees and local children. We suppose that the higher incidence of intensive care unit admission among refugees was due to the fact that lung injury and high energy trauma mechanisms such as fall from heights or motor vehicle accident were more common in Syrian refugee children. We suggest that preventive measures and parenteral education would contribute to decrease the prevalence of traumatic injuries.

Keywords: Keywords: Children, trauma, immigrant, Syria