A new study shows that an old traumatic head injury can prolong the recovery process from concussion in children.
Matthew A. Eisenberg, M.D. and his colleagues from the Harvard Medical School in Boston conducted a study, which reveals that recovery time from a concussion is doubled in children if they have suffered a traumatic head injury in the past. This duration triples if the previous head injury occurred within 12 months or less.
Participants in the study were aged approximately 14 years and most of them were boys. Also, nearly two thirds of the participants had sustained previous head injuries while participating in sports activities. Among these participants, 85 percent reported regular headaches, 65 percent reported feeling fatigued regularly and 63 percent reported dizziness. Four percent of them also reportedly showed abnormalities of balance and 2 percent were affected mentally. The study also reported that 21 percent of the participants suffered no abnormalities.
Researchers reported that during the time of injury two thirds of the participants were discharged with a prescription of "cognitive rest." Another 64 percent of the participants were asked to seek further consultation from their primary physician while 92 percent of the participants were asked to take some time out from sports activities.
"We always counsel patients that in the wake of a concussion, when they want to know what to do, one of the prime pieces of advice is to avoid additional head injury," said Michael L. Lipton, MD, PhD, of Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, who was not involved in the study, according to MedPage Today. "Here we have some pretty compelling evidence that this is very sound advice and people need to be careful in the wake of one concussion about scrupulously observing a period of time where they really avoid a second injury."
Researchers of the study concluded that older age and higher symptoms of severity were directly linked to the recovery process and that becoming unconscious during a concussion signaled a faster recovery process.
The findings for this study are published online in the journal Peditarics.
