Burnaid

Burnaid is a clinical decision support application we built for healthcare professionals managing burn patients. Available on both Google Play and the Apple App Store, the app helps doctors, surgeons, ICU specialists, emergency medicine practitioners, and nurses make faster, more accurate clinical assessments at the bedside.

Burnaid streamlines critical burn management tasks: assessing burn extent through Total Body Surface Area (TBSA) calculation, calculating fluid resuscitation volumes, planning nutritional support, recording Glasgow Coma Scale scores, and serving as a quick reference for burn-related clinical questions.

The app was conceived by a practising medical professional who identified a clear gap in everyday clinical workflows - burn assessment calculations were being done manually, often on paper, in time-pressured emergency settings where accuracy is critical. Burn Aids LLP, based in Kochi, Kerala, partnered with us at Zartek to translate this clinical insight into a polished, production-ready mobile application. The app has earned a perfect 5.0-star rating on Google Play, with reviews from doctors and nurses praising its accuracy and ease of use in emergency rooms and ICU settings.

Burn patient management is one of the most time-critical and calculation-heavy areas of emergency and critical care medicine. The accuracy of the first few hours of treatment particularly the fluid resuscitation calculation, which determines how much intravenous fluid a burn patient should receive over the first 24 hours directly impacts patient survival and recovery outcomes. Despite this, most of these calculations are still done manually in many hospitals, using mental arithmetic, paper rule-of-nines charts, and reference tables. This is slow, error-prone, and adds cognitive load on clinicians who are already managing critical patients.

The client, a practising doctor, had experienced this gap firsthand and envisioned a digital tool that would let any healthcare professional perform these calculations in seconds, at the bedside, on their phone. The challenge for our mobile app development team was to build an app that was clinically rigorous, genuinely usable in emergency settings large tap targets, fast workflows, no extraneous steps and trustworthy enough for healthcare professionals to rely on in real patient care.

The TBSA calculation in particular posed an interesting UX challenge. Traditional methods like the Wallace Rule of Nines divide the body into standard regions, but burn injuries rarely fall neatly within these zones. The app needed an intuitive way for clinicians to visually mark the burned areas on a body diagram and have the TBSA calculated automatically from that visual input. Our UI/UX design team translated this clinical need into an interactive paint feature that is both accurate and natural to use.

The fluid resuscitation calculator needed to support standard formulae such as the Parkland formula, automatically calculate volumes based on TBSA and patient weight, and present the result in a way that clinicians could immediately act on. The Glasgow Coma Scale module needed to record the patient's eye, verbal, and motor responses and compute the GCS score reliably. And the entire experience needed to feel like a clinical tool — not a consumer app with the polish and professionalism that healthcare users expect.

Key challenges included:

We designed and developed Burnaid as a cross-platform mobile app for Android and iOS, built from the ground up in close collaboration with the founding doctor. Every calculation, every workflow, and every visual element was clinically validated and aligned with real-world burn unit and emergency department needs.

The TBSA (Total Body Surface Area) calculator is the centrepiece of Burnaid and the app's most distinctive feature. Instead of asking clinicians to estimate percentages numerically, our team built an interactive body diagram where the user can simply paint over the burned regions on a visual representation of the patient's body. As the clinician marks affected areas - face, arms, torso, legs, hands, feet - the app automatically calculates the corresponding TBSA percentage based on standard anatomical surface area weightings.

This visual-first approach is faster and more accurate than traditional manual estimation. It lets the clinician focus on observing the actual burn distribution on the patient and translating it directly to the screen, rather than performing mental arithmetic. The paint feature has been one of the most appreciated capabilities of the app multiple user reviews specifically call it out as "extremely useful for burns" and a strong advantage in emergency room settings. This kind of interaction design is at the heart of how our UX consulting practice approaches clinical tools: reduce cognitive load, surface the right information at the right moment.

Once TBSA is calculated, the app automatically feeds it into the fluid resuscitation calculator. The clinician enters the patient's weight, and the app computes the total fluid volume required over the first 24 hours using accepted clinical formulae, breaking it down into the volume needed in the first 8 hours and the subsequent 16 hours the standard split for burn fluid management. The result is presented clearly so the clinician can directly translate it into a fluid order.

The nutrition planning module helps clinicians calculate the caloric and protein requirements for burn patients during recovery. Burn patients have significantly elevated metabolic demands due to the body's healing response, and accurate nutritional planning is critical for recovery outcomes. The module computes recommended intake based on patient parameters and burn severity, supporting long-term management in burn units.

The Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) module allows clinicians to record a patient's eye, verbal, and motor responses, with the app automatically computing the GCS score. This is essential not only for burn patients with associated head trauma or smoke inhalation injuries but for emergency assessment more broadly. The interface guides the user through each response category with clear options, removing the need to memorise scoring tables.

Beyond the core calculators, Burnaid includes a clinical reference module that serves as a go-to resource for burn-related clinical questions. This gives clinicians - particularly junior doctors and nurses encountering complex burn cases for the first time - quick access to relevant clinical information without leaving the app or searching external resources.

The app includes a module on diagnostic and treatment methods relevant to burn care, providing clinicians with reference content on advanced investigations and order protocols. This rounds out the app from being purely a calculator to being a more comprehensive clinical companion for burn management.

Our UI design team built the interface specifically for clinical settings. Navigation is fast and minimal, with the main tools accessible within one tap from the home screen. Visual elements use a calm, professional palette appropriate for healthcare environments. Each calculator surfaces its output clearly, with units, formulae references, and time-based breakdowns where relevant. The app prominently displays a medical disclaimer reinforcing that Burnaid is a clinical decision support tool, not a substitute for clinician judgement.

Burnaid is monetised through in-app purchases for premium features, allowing the platform to sustain ongoing development and clinical validation work. Our backend development team ensured the system is robust, scalable, and production-ready.

The result is a polished, doctor-led healthcare app that has earned a perfect 5.0-star rating on Google Play - with healthcare professionals across emergency rooms, ICUs, and burn units adopting it as part of their daily clinical workflow, turning what was once a paper-and-pencil process into a tap-and-paint workflow that saves time, reduces error, and supports better patient outcomes.

Technology Highlights

Mobile App - Cross-platform Android and iOS

TBSA Calculator - Interactive body paint tool with automatic surface area calculation

Fluid Resuscitation - Parkland-formula-based volume calculator with 8h/16h split

Nutrition Module - Caloric and protein requirement calculator for burn recovery

Glasgow Coma Scale - Eye, verbal, and motor response recording with automatic scoring

Clinical Reference - Burn care knowledge base accessible within the app

Monetisation - In-app purchases for premium features

Clinical Validation - Built in close collaboration with practising medical professional

Compliance - Clear medical disclaimer and clinical decision support framing

Distribution - Google Play (Android) and Apple App Store (iOS)

Key Features

Burn Assessment:

Fluid & Nutrition Management:

Clinical Assessment:

Reference and Support:

Platform:

Q: What is Burnaid?

A: Burnaid is a clinical decision support mobile app for healthcare professionals managing burn patients. The app helps doctors, surgeons, ICU specialists, emergency medicine practitioners, and nurses with Total Body Surface Area (TBSA) calculation, fluid resuscitation volume computation, Glasgow Coma Scale scoring, and nutrition planning for burn patient management.

Q: Who developed the Burnaid app?

A: Burnaid was designed and developed by Zartek Technologies, a product engineering company based in Kochi, India, for Burn Aids LLP, a Kerala-based healthtech company founded by a practising medical doctor. The app is the result of a doctor-led product vision delivered by Zartek’s healthcare app development team.

Q: What is TBSA and how does Burnaid calculate it?

A: TBSA (Total Body Surface Area) is a measure of the extent of a burn injury expressed as a percentage of the patient’s total body surface. Burnaid calculates TBSA through an interactive paint feature - clinicians visually mark the burned areas on a body diagram, and the app automatically computes the corresponding TBSA percentage based on standard anatomical surface area weightings.

Q: Does Burnaid help with fluid resuscitation calculation?

A: Yes. Burnaid includes a fluid resuscitation calculator that uses accepted clinical formulae (such as the Parkland formula). Once TBSA is calculated and the patient’s weight is entered, the app automatically computes the total fluid volume needed over the first 24 hours, broken down into the standard 8-hour and 16-hour intervals used in burn care.

Q: Who should use Burnaid?

A: Burnaid is designed for healthcare professionals - doctors, surgeons, ICU specialists, emergency medicine practitioners, and nurses - who manage burn patients in emergency rooms, ICUs, burn units, and long-term care settings. The app is a clinical decision support tool, not a substitute for clinician judgement.

Q: Can Zartek build healthcare or clinical decision support apps?

A: Yes. Zartek builds healthcare applications including clinical decision support tools, patient management systems, telemedicine platforms, and medical reference apps. The Burnaid app is an example of Zartek’s healthtech capability - a doctor-led product designed for clinical workflows, with rigorous calculation accuracy and a clinical-grade user experience.

Q: Is Burnaid available on iOS and Android?

A: Yes. Burnaid is available on both Google Play (Android) and the Apple App Store (iOS), making it accessible to healthcare professionals regardless of their mobile device preference.