11. Conclusions

Burn injuries due to stove bursts are long lasting and more often than not preventable.4 Burn survivors can often be left with disability and disfigurements that hinder their return to a fulfilling and productive life. 3 Greater implementation of burn prevention strategies globally would go a long way towards attenuating the unacceptable burden of death and suffering from burns.3 There are many strategies that have proved to be effective, but have not been sufficiently disseminated internationally.3

Prevention is always the rule to be safe from burns but, once they occur, immediate and proper care should be given with aggressive treatment in order to minimize post-burn problems.1 According to Peck et al (2008), "Solving this substantial problem will depend on improved surveillance by means of formal epidemiologic studies, and the contributions and collaboration of international governmental and nongovernmental organizations."9 Implementing injury prevention strategies will involve enforcement (including legislation), education and engineering.83According to the WHO publication Burn Prevention Success Stories Lessons Learned (2011),

"One cannot stress enough the importance of monitoring and evaluation. This starts with a solid understanding of the burn problem in a given area or community, including knowledge of the epidemiological pattern of burns in the area (e.g. burden and major causes and risk factors). Once prevention activities are underway, care should be taken to document the effectiveness of these efforts, so as to know what efforts are effective and thus should be continued or even expanded. Likewise, it is important to know which efforts are not successful and hence should be adjusted or even discontinued, with resources shifted elsewhere."3