Diffuse Brain Swelling in Severely Head Injured Patients

ABSTRACT

Diffuse brain swelling(bilateral swelling without shift or other lesions ; DBS) after severe head injuy in children is very common event and that DBS in children is thought to be associated with a low mortality, generally compared with adult. In this study, DBS ws compared in 9 Children and 18 adults, selected among 222 cases of severe head injured patients admitted to the Department of Neurosurgery for 4 years from January 1986 toDecember 1989. The results were summarized as follows ; 1) The incidence of DBS in children(39.1%) was about 4 time as high as for adult(9.0%). 2) There was no significant difference of mortality rate in pediatric and adult group showing DBS but there was a significant low mortality rate in pediatric group without showing DBS, in contrast to other studies.