A study to Assess the Effectiveness of Banana Leaf Dressing (BLD) among Patients with Partial Thickness Burns in Selected Hospitals at Karnataka

Burn injuries rank among the most severe types of injuries suffered by human beings with an attendant high mortality and morbidity rate. Majority of the burns patients experience pain and discomfort and many types of burn wound dressings are very difficult to remove and its removal may cause re-injury of the wound which results in pain and delayed wound healing. The present study was aimed to assess the effectiveness of Banana Leaf Dressing (BLD) in terms of reduction in discomfort, decrease in pain and easy removability of BLD among patients with partial thickness burns. A quasi experimental non-equivalent control group pre test and post test design was selected for the present study. Forty four patients with partial thickness burns (22 each in both experimental and control group) were selected by adopting non probability purposive sampling technique. The findings revealed that the post test discomfort and pain scores were significantly lower than the pre test discomfort and pain scores at before dressing, during dressing and 20min after dressing which was tested by using repeated measures of ANOVA and Bonferroni correction which were significant at 0.05 level of significance. The significance of difference between the mean post test discomfort scores at before dressing, during dressing and 20min after dressing of experimental and control group which were statistically tested by using independent 't' test was not found to be significant at 0.05 level of significance. The majority of the burns patients who underwent Banana Leaf Dressing experienced easy removal of BLD in all days.

Thus it is concluded that Banana Leaf Dressing is effective in terms of reduction in discomfort, decrease in pain and easy removability among patients with partial thickness burns.