MILD TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY - SEARCHING FOR THE SYNDROME

A prospective study compared 22 consecutively admitted patients with mild traumatic brain injury (MTBT) to matched orthopedically injured (OI) and uninjured control subjects on measures of injury severity, symptoms, and disability immediately after injury and at 6 months after injury. The results showed that the method for evaluating symptoms (ie, volunteered versus elicited) has a significant effect on symptom frequency and ability of symptoms to differentiate the MTBI group from the other groups. In comparison to OI and control subjects, a small but significant percentage of,MTBI subjects volunteered somatic and cognitive symptoms at 6 months after injury, suggesting that these symptoms are core components of the postconcussion disorder. Pain and emotional distress also seem to contribute to the disorder but appear to represent the general effects of trauma rather than the specific effects of MTBI. The presence of pain has a significant effect on recovery from trauma, including MTBI. A significant percentage of MTBI and OI subjects perceive that they have not recovered by 6 months after injury; however, there appears to be a specific perception of vocational disability after MTBI that is primarily characterized by cognitive symptoms and is not accounted for by a more general effect of trauma.