Traumatology
From ArticleWorld
Traumatology is the medical science of how individuals experience physical trauma, how traumatized patients heal as well as how to treat patients who have experienced trauma. Traumatologists are often surgeons who practice in the area of accident surgery.
Scope
Some of those who study traumatology do so in a laboratory using laboratory animals or human-like dummies. They study the forces involved in sustaining certain types of trauma, such as those experienced in motor vehicle accidents. They also study the effects of certain types of trauma such as open wounds, blunt trauma and the effects of caustic agents on the body.
Other traumatologists build on the laboratory work and study the ways in which medicine can be of the most benefit to traumatized patients. They study different surgical techniques and new devices that can promote bone healing, wound healing and can reduce the possibility of infection.
Practicing traumatologists work with trauma patients, usually in established trauma centers. They are generally surgeons; however, orthopedists can function in the capacity as traumatologists in some cases. Treating a trauma patient often requires the skills of multiple specialists who must deal with medical issues as well as trauma issues. For example, a person involved in a motor vehicle accident may have diabetes or heart disease that must be factored into their treatment. Neurological problems, too, can affect the trauma patient.
Triage
One of the basic tenets of traumatology is the understanding of triage. This applies to mass casualty situations, battlefield situations and anytime the number of patients overwhelms available resources. Sometimes this means that the most critical patients who are likely to die regardless of treatment are left behind in order to treat less critically traumatized patients. At the lowest end of the triage scale are patients who have non-life-threatening injuries that often must wait to be treated while more seriously injured patients are addressed.