title: Adrenal Injuries: Historical Facts and Modern Truths.
abstract: Prior to the advent of whole body computed tomography, injuries of the adrenal gland were almost exclusively identified on postmortem examinations and were associated with severe injury. Recent literature has continued to identify an association between adrenal injuries and high ISS. The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of adrenal trauma on ISS and mortality while controlling for potential confounding factors.
  
  
  
  A 15-year retrospective review for all adrenal gland injuries from a Level 1 Trauma Center's Trauma Registry was performed. Based on the characteristics of that patient population, the same Trauma Registry was then queried for case-matched patients, and the two groups compared to assess the influence of adrenal gland injuries on mortality.
  
  
  
  Seventy-two patients with adrenal injuries were identified and compared to 1026 case-matched patients. The adrenal gland injury was not a contributing factor in any of the study group mortalities. The mean ISS for the adrenal gland injured group was higher than the overall Registry ISS (18.7 vs 10.6) but almost identical to the ISS of patients case matched for abdominal injuries.
  
  
  
  Case-matched analysis based on multiple clinical variables demonstrates that the ISS of patients with adrenal gland injuries were similar to the ISS of patients with other injuries to the abdominal region and were in fact associated with a 0.02% decrease in mortality.
authors.affiliation: Division of Trauma, Department of Surgery, Nassau University Medical Center, 2201 Hempstead Turnpike, East Meadow, NY, 11554, USA. jdigiac1@numc.edu.
authors.forename: Jody C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: DiGiacomo
authors.affiliation: Division of Trauma, Department of Surgery, Nassau University Medical Center, 2201 Hempstead Turnpike, East Meadow, NY, 11554, USA.
authors.forename: L D George
authors.initials: LD
authors.lastname: Angus
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Professions, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Edward
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Coffield
mesh_terms: D000311:Adrenal Glands / Q000293:injuries*; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015601:Injury Severity Score; D008297:Male; D012042:Registries; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000401:mortality