Traumatic Head Injury in Children

Head trauma in children is a major public health problem. A leading cause of death, it also results in a spectrum of morbidity involving cognition, academic achievement, and social interaction. A primary goal of this book is to explore sources of unexplained variability in outcome. One important source of variability is the developmental stage. Children are evolving organisms for whom a static conceptualization of outcome may misconstrue the effects of traumatic brain injury. For clinicians, this volume will provide easy access into the mainstream of research on traumatic brain injury in children, its pathophysiology, treatment, and outcome. For scientists specializing in cognition and development, and for those in the basic neurosciences, the studies of traumatic brain injury discussed in this book provide a unique opportunity to relate brain structure to patterns of behaviour. Modern neurodiagnostic techniques have created new possibilities for understanding the neurological basis of the diverse behavioural deficits shown by head-injured children. The contributors to this volume have not only presented detailed analyses of our present state of knowledge of the diverse determinants of outcome in children with head injury, but they have also emphasized the gaps and limitation in our knowledge.

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