By: Russell Keener  —  March 21, 2011
 

Brain injuries are seri­ous. Even a “mild” brain injury can have seri­ous life-altering effects. Every year nearly 1.5 mil­lion Amer­i­cans expe­ri­ence some type of head trauma. Regard­less of whether the injury is clas­si­fied as “mild”, “mod­er­ate”, or “severe”, the injury impacts not only the vic­tim, but the entire family.

Car Acci­dents or Job Injuries are a com­mon cause of trau­madic brain injuries (TBI). The brain is the con­sis­tency of Jello. When there is a sud­den decel­er­a­tion of the brain within the skull bruis­ing or more seri­ous lei­sions or lascer­a­tions can occure.

If you or a loved one has been involved in an acci­dent involv­ing the head, it is impor­tant to know the sysmp­toms of a brain injury. Many times the vic­tim is not aware of their changes and a friend or fam­ily mem­ber is in the best posi­tion to rec­og­nize their changes.

Symp­toms of a “Mild” Brain Injury

• Paral­y­sis (inabil­ity to move cer­tain body parts)
• Prob­lems with sequenc­ing (inabil­ity to plan and per­form multi step projects)
• Loss of inter­ac­tion with others
• Loss of flex­i­bil­ity in thinking
• Over-focusing on a sin­gle thought
• Inabil­ity to stay on task
• Mood changes
• Social behav­ior changes
• Per­son­al­ity changes
• Prob­lem solv­ing challenges
• Dif­fi­culty in express­ing themselves
• Dif­fi­culty multitasking
• Dif­fi­culty in nam­ing a sim­ple, ordi­nary object
• Dif­fi­culty reading
• Inabil­ity to deter­mine the “right” word when writing
• Prob­lems reading
• Prob­lems drawing
• Prob­lem dis­tin­guish­ing left from right
• Prob­lems doing math
• Prob­lems with self care aris­ing from dif­fi­culty of aware­ness of cer­tain body parts
• Dif­fi­culty focus­ing visual attention
• Prob­lems with eye-hand coordination
• Prob­lems iden­ti­fy­ing colors
• Hal­lu­ci­na­tions
• Inabil­ity rec­og­niz­ing words
• Dif­fi­culty rec­og­niz­ing faces
• Loss of short-term memory
• Prob­lems with long-term memory
• Decreased (or increase) in sex­ual behavior
• Per­sis­tent talking
• Increase in aggres­sive behavior
• Dif­fi­culty breathing
• Dif­fi­culty swallowing
• Bal­ance and move­ment problems
• Ver­tigo (dizzy, nausea)
• Insom­nia
• Loss of fine motor skills
• Impaired abil­ity to walk
• Dif­fi­culty reach­ing out to grab an object
• Tremors
• Slurred speech
• Decreased abil­ity to make rapid movement
• Loss of con­scious­ness (LOC) from a few sec­onds to a few minutes.
• No LOC but a gen­eral feel­ing of being con­fused, dis­ori­ented, or dazed
• Vom­it­ing, gen­eral nausea
• Ring­ing in the ears
• Bad taste in the mouth
• Light sen­si­tiv­ity
• Gen­eral drowsi­ness or fatigue
• Sleep­ing more than usual

Some of these symp­toms may appear imme­di­atly after the trauma. Oth­ers may not mate­ri­al­ize for days or weeks after the injury.

“Mod­er­ate” or “Severe” TBI

Mod­er­ate or severe TBI can can include any of the symp­toms above, as well as:

• Pro­found confusion
• Com­bat­ive­ness
• Slurred speech
• Numb­ness or weak­ness in the arms and legs
• Lost coor­di­na­tion
• Lost blad­der or bowel con­trol (incontinence)
• Con­tin­ual headaches or headaches that get worse
• Repet­i­tive vom­it­ing or nausea
• Seizures and convulsions
• Dila­tion of the pupils
• Clear fluid from the ears or nose.

Chil­dren and Infants

Chil­dren and infants may lack the abil­ity to express sen­sory prob­lems, con­fu­sion, headaches and other symp­toms. Be par­tic­u­larly mind­ful of the fol­low­ing sysm­poms in children.

• Lost inter­est in favorite activ­i­ties or toys
• Changed sleep­ing habits
• Changes in their abil­ity to pay attention
• Con­tin­ual crying
• Depres­sion or sadness
• Incon­solable
• Eas­ily irritated
• Changes with eat­ing or nurs­ing habits

When to Con­sult a Doctor

Always see a doc­tor if you or your child has expe­ri­enced a blow to the head. Seek med­ical care if there are any of the signs or symp­toms of TBI fol­low­ing a blow to the head.
While mild, mod­er­ate and severe are terms used to express the injury on brain func­tion, even a mild brain injury is a seri­ous injury that requires an accu­rate diag­no­sis and prompt med­ical attention.

If you or a loved one has suf­fered a blow the the head caused by some­one else’s fault, con­sult the brain injury experts at the Keener Law Firm. Mr. Keener or one of the lawyers at the firm have years of expe­ri­ence deal­ing with these types of seri­ous cases and are pre­pared to offer you a free, con­fi­den­tial consultation.