Mild brain injuries can occur anytime, anyplace
(Mirror Daily, United States) Every parent experiences that terrible moment when finding their children with an injury on their head because they had fallen off the bed or off the bike or had just hurt themselves on the playground. The moment passes, the injury heals, the memory remains, but doctors also draw attention to the fact that mild brain injuries might get severe.
What does it mean that mild brain injuries might get severe? It means that they may have a long-term effect, resulting in psychological problems and even shorter life spam.
A new study investigating this issue was led by Seena Fazel (University of Oxford, United Kingdom) and his team. Their research was bases on the results obtained from 100,000 Swedish people born between 1973 and 1985, and who reported at least one traumatic brain injury (TBI) before the age of 25. What they investigated was the rate of premature mortality and getting some sort of mental disease.
Although traumatic brain injuries are believed to cause the most damages, mild brain injuries are not to be ignored. Specialist Seena Fazel also focused on them in the study. In the case of a trauma, there are 10 percent chances that the adult person should develop a psychiatric illness, and 2 percent chances of dying at a younger age than the usual, the new research shows.
Doctors advise parents to keep a close watch on their babies and children while they are at home, in order to prevent accidents from happening.
The Unites States have a high rate of traumatic brain injuries, most of them caused by car accidents. They also lead to the death of 1.7 million people each year, according to the data provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dr. Bradley Sandella (Christiana Care Health System, Wilmington) approves of the results of the study held by Professor Seena Fazel:
“For some time, there has been speculation within the medical community that there is a strong link between traumatic brain injury and psychiatric issues.”
Caution is required anywhere, from both parents, children, teenagers, and elderly people. Any minor injury can result in a very unpleasant medical problem, even if treated in its due time. The most important thing to do is always to be careful and preventing diseases before happening rather than treating them.
The study on brain injuries was published earlier this week in PLOS Medicine.
Image courtesy of: Wikipedia