Burn Care Why Water-Jel? Burn injured patients can be very complex and expensive, recovery may take weeks, months or years depending upon age and severity. An effective initial response is important for the patient. Burn injuries are time-sensitive, every second counts. Burn injuries are time-sensitive, every second counts. As the cooling mechanism is by a convective process, Water-Jel emergency burn dressings do not support the onset of hypothermia, and do not require any support from the further application of water. Basically “water not required”. This is ideal for all situations where cool clean running water is just not available, either due to a lack of supply, contaminated source, limited supply required for survival as drinking water, isolated, hostile or austere location etc.