This article reports on a study that tested the hypothesis that errors in the total body surface area (percent TBSA) estimates, using Lund and Browder (L&B) tables, were due to differences in the physical proportions of today's children compared with children in the early 1940s, when the chart was developed; and that these differences would appear as body mass index (BMI)-associated systematic errors in the L&B values versus actual body surface areas.
The study measured the TBSA of human pediatric cadavers with computed tomography scans. Subjects ranged from 9 months to 15 years in age. Researchers chose outliers of the BMI distribution (from the 31st percentile at the low through the 99th percentile at the high). Researchers examined surface-area proportions corresponding to L&B regions. The study found that measured regional proportions based on computed tomography scans were in reasonable agreement with L&B, even with subjects in the tails of the BMI range. The largest deviation was 3.4 percent, significantly less than the error seen in real-world percent TBSA estimates.(publisher abstract modified)