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Understanding Brain Trauma: Causes, Types, and Effects

Explore the various facets of brain trauma, including its origins, manifestations, and implications on neurological function. Learn about different types such as focal injuries, diffuse axonal injury, and spinal cord trauma.

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Understanding Brain Trauma: Causes, Types, and Effects

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  1. Alterations of Neurologic Function Chapter 17

  2. Brain Trauma • Traumatic brain injury • A traumatic insult to the brain possibly producing physical, intellectual, emotional, social, and vocational changes • 50% are motor vehicle accidents • 21% are falls • Others: violence and sports

  3. Brain Trauma • Blunt (closed, nonmissile) trauma • Head strikes hard surface or a rapidly moving object strikes the head • The dura remains intact and brain tissues are not exposed to the environment • Causes focal (local) or diffuse (general) brain injuries • Open (penetrating, missile) trauma • Injury breaks the dura and exposes the cranial contents to the environment • Causes primarily focal injuries

  4. Brain Trauma • Coup injury • Injury directly below the point of impact • Contrecoup • Injury on the pole opposite the site of impact • Compound fractures • Basilar skull fracture

  5. Brain Trauma

  6. Focal Brain Injury • Observable brain lesion • Force of impact typically produces contusions • Contusions can cause: • Extradural (epidural) hemorrhages or hematomas • Subdural hematomas • Intracerebral hematomas

  7. Extradural (Epidural) Hematomas

  8. Subdural (Epidural) Hematomas

  9. Diffuse Brain Injury • Diffuse axonal injury (DAI) • Shaking, inertial effect • Acceleration/deceleration • Axonal damage • Shearing, tearing, or stretching of nerve fibers • Severity corresponds to the amount of shearing force applied to the brain and brain stem

  10. Diffuse Brain Injury (DAI) • Categories: • Mild concussion • Classical concussion • Mild, moderate, and severe diffuse axonal injuries (DAI)

  11. Mild Concussion • Temporary axonal disturbances causing attention and memory deficits but no loss of consciousness • I—confusion, disorientation, and momentary amnesia • II—momentary confusion and retrograde amnesia • III—confusion with retrograde and anterograde amnesia

  12. Classic Cerebral Concussion • Grade IV • Disconnection of cerebral systems from the brain stem and reticular activating system • Physiologic and neurologic dysfunction without substantial anatomic disruption • Loss of consciousness (<6 hours) • Anterograde and retrograde amnesia

  13. Diffuse Axonal Injury • Produces a traumatic coma lasting more than 6 hours because of axonal disruption • Mild • Moderate • Severe

  14. Spinal Cord Trauma • Most commonly occurs due to vertebral injuries • Simple fracture, compressed fracture, and comminuted fracture • Traumatic injury of vertebral and neural tissues due to compressing, pulling, or shearing forces • Most common locations: cervical (1, 2, 4-7), and T1–L2 lumbar vertebrae • Locations reflect most mobile portions of vertebral column and the locations where the spinal cord occupies most of the vertebral canal

  15. Spinal Cord Trauma

  16. Spinal Cord Trauma

  17. Spinal Cord Trauma • Spinal shock • Normal activity of the spinal cord ceases at and below the level of injury. Sites lack continuous nervous discharges from the brain. • Complete loss of reflex function (skeletal, bladder, bowel, sexual function, thermal control, and autonomic control)

  18. Spinal Cord Trauma

  19. Spinal Cord Trauma • Paraplegia • Quadriplegia • Autonomic hyperreflexia (dysreflexia) • Massive, uncompensated cardiovascular response to stimulation of the sympathetic nervous system • Stimulation of the sensory receptors below the level of the cord lesion

  20. Autonomic Hyperreflexia

  21. Degenerative Disorders of the Spine • Degenerative disk disease (DDD) • Spondylolysis • Spondylolisthesis • Spinal stenosis • Low back pain • Herniated intervertebral disk

  22. Cerebrovascular Disorders • Cerebrovascular accidents (CVAs) • Thrombotic stroke • Arterial occlusions caused by thrombi formed in arteries supplying the brain or in the intracranial vessels • Transient ischemic attacks • Embolic stroke • Fragments that break from a thrombus formed outside the brain

  23. Cerebrovascular Disorders • Hemorrhagic stroke • Lacunar stroke • Cerebral infarction • Cerebral hemorrhage

  24. Cerebrovascular Disorders • Intracranial aneurysm • Saccular (berry) aneurysms • Fusiform (giant) aneurysms • Mycotic aneurysms • Traumatic aneurysms

  25. Intracranial Aneurysm

  26. Cerebrovascular Disorders • Vascular malformations • Cavernous angiomas • Capillary telangiectasis • Venous angioma • Arteriovenous malformation

  27. Cerebrovascular Disorders • Subarachnoid hemorrhage • Blood escapes from defective or injured vasculature into the subarachnoid space • Manifestations • Kernig sign • Brudzinski sign

  28. Headache • Migraine headache • Trigger factors • Aura • Cluster headache • Several attacks can occur during the day for a periods of days followed by a long period of spontaneous remission

  29. Headache • Chronic paroxysmal hemicrania • Cluster-type headache that occurs with more daily frequency but with shorter duration • Tension-type headache • Mild to moderate bilateral headache with a sensation of a tight band or pressure around the head

  30. Central Nervous System Tumors • Cranial tumors • Primary intracerebral tumors (gliomas) • Astrocytoma • Oligodendroglioma • Ependymoma • Primary extracerebral tumors • Meningioma • Nerve sheath tumors • Metastatic carcinoma

  31. Central Nervous System Tumors • Spinal cord tumors • Intramedullary tumors • Extramedullary tumors • Intradural • Extradural • Manifestations • Compressive syndrome • Irritative syndrome • Syringomyelic syndrome

  32. Spinal Cord Tumors

  33. Infection and Inflammation of the CNS • Meningitis • Bacterial meningitis • Aseptic (viral, nonpurulent, lymphocytic) meningitis • Fungal meningitis • Tubercular (TB) meningitis

  34. Meningitis

  35. Infection and Inflammation of the CNS • Suppurative cerebral masses • Cerebral abscess • Spinal cord abscess • Intramedullary spinal cord abscess

  36. Infection and Inflammation of the CNS • Encephalitis • Acute febrile illness, usually of viral origin with nervous system involvement • Most common forms of encephalitis are caused by arthropod-borne viruses and herpes simplex virus

  37. Neurologic Complications of AIDS • Human immunodeficiency-associated cognitive dysfunction • HIV myelopathy • HIV neuropathy • Aseptic viral meningitis • Opportunistic infections • Cytomegalovirus infections • Parasitic infection • CNS neoplasms

  38. Lyme Disease • Tick-borne spirochete bacterial infection • Borrelia burgdorferi • Progression • Introduced by tick bite • Incubates 3 to 32 days • Migrates to skin, lymph nodes, and other body systems • Stages

  39. Demyelinating Disorders • Multiple sclerosis (MS) • MS is a progressive, inflammatory, demyelinating disorder of the CNS • Types: • Mixed (general) • Spinal • Cerebellar

  40. Peripheral Nervous System Disorders • Neuropathies • Generalized symmetric polyneuropathies • Distal axonal polyneuropathy • Demyelinating polyneuropathy • Generalized neuropathies • Sensory neuropathies • Focal or multifocal neuropathies

  41. Peripheral Nervous System Disorders • Guillain-Barré syndrome • Acquired inflammatory disease causing demyelination of the peripheral nerves with relative sparing of axons • Acute onset, ascending motor paralysis • Humoral and cellular immunologic reaction

  42. Peripheral Nervous System Disorders • Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) • Classic ALS—“Lou Gehrig disease” • Diffusely affects upper and lower motor neurons of the cerebral cortex, brain stem, and spinal cord (corticospinal tracts and anterior roots) • Disease leads to progressive weakness leading to respiratory failure and death • Patient has normal intellectual and sensory function until death

  43. Peripheral Nervous System Disorders • Radiculopathies • Radiculitis • Inflammation of the spinal nerve roots • Radicular pain • Plexus injures • Involves the nerve plexus distal to the spinal roots but proximal to the formation of the peripheral nerves

  44. Neuromuscular Junction Disorders • Myasthenia gravis • Chronic autoimmune disease • An IgG antibody is produced against acetylcholine receptors (antiacetylcholine receptor antibodies) • Weakness and fatigue of muscles of the eyes and the throat causing diplopia, difficulty chewing, talking, swallowing

  45. Neuromuscular Junction Disorders • Myasthenia gravis • Classification • Neonatal myasthenia • Congenital myasthenia • Juvenile myasthenia • Ocular myasthenia • Generalized autoimmune myasthenia • Myasthenia crisis • Cholinergic crisis

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