Articles: brain-injuries.
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Multicenter Study Comparative Study
International study of emergency department care for pediatric traumatic brain injury and the role of CT scanning.
Our objective was to investigate the use of CT and its relationship to head injury severity and age. ⋯ The majority of children did not need significant medical intervention. Physicians ordered X-ray investigations more frequently than CT scanning. The use of X-ray to decide whether or not CT is necessary is not warranted. The implications of positive CTs in mild or moderate injuries were most noteworthy, as were age-related interactions with positive CT findings.
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J. Cereb. Blood Flow Metab. · Apr 2001
The maxi-K channel opener BMS-204352 attenuates regional cerebral edema and neurologic motor impairment after experimental brain injury.
Large-conductance, calcium-activated potassium (maxi-K) channels regulate neurotransmitter release and neuronal excitability, and openers of these channels have been shown to be neuroprotective in models of cerebral ischemia. The authors evaluated the effects of postinjury systemic administration of the maxi-K channel opener, BMS-204352, on behavioral and histologic outcome after lateral fluid percussion (FP) traumatic brain injury (TBI) in the rat. Anesthetized Sprague-Dawley rats (n = 142) were subjected to moderate FP brain injury (n = 88) or surgery without injury (n = 54) and were randomized to receive a bolus of 0.1 mg/kg BMS-204352 (n = 26, injured; n = 18, sham), 0.03 mg/kg BMS-204352 (n = 25, injured; n = 18, sham), or 2% dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) in polyethylene glycol (vehicle, n = 27, injured; n = 18, sham) at 10 minutes postinjury. ⋯ Administration of 0.03 mg/kg BMS-204352 significantly reduced cerebral edema in the ipsilateral thalamus (P < 0.05). No effects on cognitive function or cortical tissue loss were observed with either dose. These results suggest that the novel maxi-K channel opener BMS-204352 may be selectively beneficial in the treatment of experimental TBI.
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Comparative Study
The effects of litigation on symptom expression: a prospective study following mild traumatic brain injury.
To prospectively assess the association between litigation and neurobehavioural symptoms following mild Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). ⋯ the data demonstrate an association between litigation and increased psychological distress at the outset of the litigation process. While association is not synonymous with causality, the absence of demographic, premorbid and TBI related differences between litigants and non-litigants suggests that the pursuit of compensation may influence the subjective expression of symptoms following mild traumatic brain injury.
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Experimental neurology · Apr 2001
Therapeutic effects of environmental enrichment on cognitive function and tissue integrity following severe traumatic brain injury in rats.
Postinjury environmental enrichment (EE) has been shown to alter functional and anatomical outcomes in a number of injury paradigms, including traumatic brain injury (TBI). The question of whether EE alters functional outcome following TBI in a model which produces overt histopathological consequences has not been addressed. We investigated this question using the severe, parasagittal fluid percussion injury (FPI) model. ⋯ At 14 days post-TBI, enriched animals had approximately twofold smaller lesion areas in regions of the cerebral cortex posterior to the injury epicenter (-4.5, -5.8, -6.8 mm relative to bregma; P < 0.05) compared to injured/standard animals. In addition, overall lesion volume for the entire injured cortical hemisphere was significantly smaller in animals recovering in the enriched environment. These results indicate that noninvasive environmental stimulation is beneficial in attenuating cognitive deficits and preserving tissue integrity in a TBI model which causes cerebral contusion and cell death.
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A report of a case of a patient with severe head trauma with pneumonia and cerebral infarction transported by helicopter. An eighty-year-old male was referred to our hospital because of dyspnea after a fall during sightseeing at Hiroshima. He was lucid at first, but, after two days presented restlessness due to brain contusional hemorrhage and edema. ⋯ The patient was carried to a waiting ambulance and transported to the hospital. Total transport time was only two hours and thirty minutes. This is a case showing a helicopter could safely transport a patient with severe brain damage over a long distance in a short time.