Cytokines mark the new frontier for treating major burns NEW YORK -Betty Shabazz's burns made her whole body weep. At the same time, histamine, bradykinins, and oxygen free radicals released by burns increased vascular permeability. In the kind of burn that the widow of Malcolm X suffered, all body processes accelerate. Metabolism, core temperature, protein breakdown, lipolysis, and stress hormones increase.
Patients lose muscle and become more susceptible to infection.
Pain activates the limbic system. Because of massive edema, patients are hugely swollen, occasionally doubling their original weight. But if they aren't adequately nourished their muscle mass can waste away. While better nutrition, early debridement, improved grafts, and artificial skin have boosted survival rates, new layers of complexity in burn wounds are emerging, according to interviews and to reports at the American Burn Association meeting here. Cytokines, especially interleukins 1 and 6 and tumor necrosis factor, may be key to many of the local and systemic effects.