Journal of neurotrauma
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2016
The UCLA Study of Children with Moderate to Severe Traumatic Brain Injury: Event-Related Potential Measure of Interhemispheric Transfer Time.
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) frequently results in diffuse axonal injury and other white matter damage. The corpus callosum (CC) is particularly vulnerable to injury following TBI. Damage to this white matter tract has been associated with impaired neurocognitive functioning in children with TBI. ⋯ This subgroup of TBI children with slow IHTT also had significantly poorer neurocognitive functioning than healthy controls-even after correction for premorbid intellectual functioning. We discuss alternative models for the relationship between IHTT and neurocognitive functioning following TBI. Slow IHTT may be a biomarker that identifies children at risk for poor cognitive functioning following moderate/severe TBI.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2016
CONTRECOUP TRAUMATIC INTRACEREBRAL HEMORRHAGE: A GEOMETRIC STUDY OF THE IMPACT SITE AND ASSOCIATION WITH HEMORRHAGIC PROGRESSION.
Traumatic intracerebral hemorrhage (TICH) represents 13-48% of the lesions after a traumatic brain injury (TBI). The frequency of TICH-hemorrhagic progression (TICH-HP) is estimated to be approximately 38-63%. The relationship between the impact site and TICH location has been described in many autopsy-based series. ⋯ Factors independently associated with TICH-HP obtained through logistic regression included an initial volume of <1 cc, cisternal compression, falls, acute subdural hematoma, multiple TICHs, and contrecoup TICHs. We demonstrated a significant association between the TICH location and impact site. The contrecoup represents a risk factor independently associated with hemorrhagic progression.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2016
Contusion contrast extravasation depicted on multidetector computed tomography angiography predicts growth and mortality in traumatic brain contusion.
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the main cause of death in trauma victims and causes high rates of disability and neurological sequelae. Approximately 38-65% of traumatic brain contusions (TBC) demonstrate hemorrhagic expansion on serial computed tomography (CT) scans. Thus far, however, no single variable can accurately predict the hemorrhage expansion of a TBC. ⋯ In addition, expansion of the hemorrhagic component of the TBC was detected in 61.1% of the CE-positive patients, whereas expansion was only observed in 10% of the CE-negative patients (p < 0.001). Poor outcome was observed in 24.2% of the patients in the CE-negative group, but in the presence of CE, 72.7% evolved with poor outcome (p < 0.001). The CE was a strong independent predictor of expansion, poor outcome, and increased risk of in-hospital mortality in our series of patients with TBC.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2016
Neuropsychological, metabolic, and GABAA receptor studies in subjects with repetitive traumatic brain injury.
Repetitive traumatic brain injury (rTBI) occurs as a result of mild and accumulative brain damage. A prototype of rTBI is chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), which is a degenerative disease that occurs in patients with histories of multiple concussions or head injuries. Boxers have been the most commonly studied patient group because they may experience thousands of subconcussive hits over the course of a career. ⋯ Glucose metabolism was impaired in frontal areas associated with cognitive dysfunction, similar to findings in Alzheimer's disease. Low binding potential (BP) of (18)F-flumazenil (FMZ) was found in the angular gyrus and temporal cortical regions, revealing neuronal deficits. These results suggested that cognitive impairment and motor dysfunction reflect chronic damage to neurons in professional boxers with rTBI.
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Journal of neurotrauma · Jun 2016
Using post-traumatic amnesia to predict outcome following traumatic brain injury.
Duration of post-traumatic amnesia (PTA) has emerged as a strong measure of injury severity after traumatic brain injury (TBI). Despite the growing international adoption of this measure, there remains a lack of consistency in the way in which PTA duration is used to classify severity of injury. This study aimed to establish the classification of PTA that would best predict functional or productivity outcomes. ⋯ This finding indicates that the greatest accuracy in prognosis is likely to be achieved using PTA as a continuous variable. This enables the probability of productive outcomes to be estimated with far greater precision than that possible using a classification system. Categorizing PTA to classify severity of injury may be reducing the precision with which clinicians can plan the treatment of patients after TBI.