687 A Free Online Tool to Predict Heat Risk During Physical Activity in Well-healed Burn Survivors

TL;DR

A free online tool predicts heat risk for burn survivors during physical activity, helping them safely engage in exercise.

Contribution

Development of a personalized heat risk calculator for burn survivors using a modified thermal model.

Findings

Burn survivors have impaired sweating and increased heat risk during physical activity.

The tool uses environmental and personal data to forecast heat risk over 20 hours.

The calculator aims to encourage safe physical activity and reduce sedentary lifestyles in burn survivors.

Abstract

Burn survivors have an increased risk of heat-related illnesses and experience a heightened perceptual strain during physical activity. This is due to severely impaired body temperature regulation secondary to the absence of sweating from grafted skin. Both responses will dissuade well-healed burn survivors from receiving the cardiovascular and metabolic benefits of being physically active. We propose that informing burn survivors of their unique risk of excessive elevations in core temperature, or more importantly the lack thereof, will promote physical activity in this population.

We developed a burn survivor heat risk calculator, which is a freely accessible web-based tool to inform burn survivors of their heat risk during physical activity. Gagge’s two-node thermal physiological model was modified to account for the adverse thermoregulatory consequences of burn injuries, namely a decreased ability to sweat from burn-injured skin. Model inputs include the percent body surface area burned, local environmental conditions (obtained from public domain weather data from the inputted city), physical activity intensity and duration, body height and weight, and clothing worn (Figure 1).

The developed and validated tool forecasts a personalized heat risk across the ensuing 20-hour period, based on predicted core temperature responses calculated from the indicated parameters (Figure 2).

This freely available online tool is designed to be user-friendly and simple to use. The output informs the burn survivor of their unique heat risk status based on their physical characteristics, selected physical activity, and local environmental conditions.

We propose that thermal intolerance contributes to burn survivors living a more sedentary lifestyle than the general population (PMID: 24043241), which contributes to a heightened incidence of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases (PMID: 26777451). This tool will convey to the burn survivor their unique heat risk of performing the desired physical activity, while reassuring each that the activity is safe when the calculator rates that heat risk level as low to moderate.

This project was funded by the NIH.

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