ABSTRACT
A 10-year-old white boy was brought to the emergency room after it was reported to Child Protective Services that he disclosed that his mother burned him with a hot fork. The child reportedly told school officials that her mother was very angry at him because of his poor behaviour and had taken a kitchen fork, heated it on the stove and had pressed it into his skin in several locations (Images 93a and 93b). He initially told no one, but one of his classmates noticed the marks and his teacher asked him how they occurred. https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780429170423/e1d751c1-a9c7-4bb9-9d59-53742c84031a/content/fig93a.jpg"/> https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780429170423/e1d751c1-a9c7-4bb9-9d59-53742c84031a/content/fig93b.jpg"/>
Are these findings consistent with the child’s disclosure?
What prognosis for healing and potential scarring should be considered?
210 https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780429170423/e1d751c1-a9c7-4bb9-9d59-53742c84031a/content/fig93c.jpg"/> https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780429170423/e1d751c1-a9c7-4bb9-9d59-53742c84031a/content/fig93d.jpg"/>The images depict burns and other injury in non-specific and specific patterns. The linear patterns shown are very uncommon and are consistent with drawing the hot fork down the skin to cause linear burns. The pattern of burning suggested intentional injury with infliction of pain which should be considered by the investigators. 1 , 2 Given the prolonged painful contact with a hot implement, such practices have been considered ‘torture’ in certain circumstances.
Two weeks later, the lesions were evident and showed evidence of early scar formation (Images 93c and 93d). The persistence of lesions and delayed healing suggested the increased risk of long-term scar formation.
