Types of Traumatic Brain Injuries in Montgomery County

There are several different types of brain injuries, which can be caused by a variety of factors including lack of oxygen to the brain, which typically occurs in drowning or any kind of suffocation accident. There are also brain injuries that are the result of receiving structural damage to the brain, a common example of which is a blow to the head that either causes bleeding or damage to the brain stem or the cellular structure of the brain.

If you have suffered either type of these brain injuries due to the negligence of another person or business, it is important you consult with a Montgomery County traumatic brain injury lawyer to begin filing your claim. Below is more information on the different types of brain injuries and the impact they can have.

Distinguishing Between Different Brain Injuries

The doctors are able to distinguish what types of brain injuries are present in a client by performing a differential diagnosis, which is a system of ruling out possibilities until a viable one remains.

They will conduct this differential diagnosis through physical examinations, interview questions with potentially injured person, and also by conducting and interpreting various diagnostic tests such as MRIs, CT scans and/or PET scans of the brain and head.

Why Is It Important to Know What Kind of TBI You Have?

It is important you know what injury you have, because if you know what type of traumatic brain injury you have, then you would know the best way to treat it. In a mild case, there will be different levels of treatment as opposed to someone who has a severe major traumatic brain injury. If someone has a major traumatic brain injury, then immediate or emergency surgery can be an option to help treat the injury.  If there is pressure being put on the brain, the surgery can be used to relieve the pressure and hopefully treat the brain injury. On the other hand, if the doctors believe that there may be a more mild traumatic brain injury, they might take a wait and see approach to see what would happen as time goes on where the injury could potentially heal itself.

Primary Traumatic Brain Injuries

Primary traumatic brain injuries include bleeding on the brain or lesions on the brain or injuries to the structure cells of the brain or lack of oxygen to the brain. These are typically the most severe brain injuries.

How Are Primary TBI Injuries Typically Sustained?

A direct injury to the brain is usually the result of a direct blow to the head, a fall, or some kind of force impacting upon the head that causes the brain to shift or move inside the skull and rub up against the bone of the skull. Oftentimes this causes direct injury to the cellular structure of the brain. These are diagnosed using diagnostic testing such as a MRI, PET scan, or CT scan of the brain.

Treatment of a Primary TBI Injury

These injuries are treated often times with brain surgery, or through courses of pain medicine. These injuries could also be treated with diuretics, which would decrease the amount of fluid and tissues in the brain, which will hopefully release some of the pressures on the brain, if the brain is swollen inside of the head.

A person could also suffer seizures from a traumatic brain injury, so they may be given anti-seizure medicine.  The doctor could, if the person has a severe enough injury, induce a coma in order to preserve some of the functions of the brain and make sure it’s not deprived by oxygen for the time being. After they feel that some progress is made, then the doctors would revive the person from the coma and hopefully, the person will have experienced some relief from the symptoms and effects of the brain injury.

Secondary Brain Injuries

Secondary injuries could be more mild injuries where there is no actual permanent damage to the structure of the brain. It could just be a swelling of the brain or the brain was shaken or jostled inside of the skull and there was no actual structural damage. Some side effects or symptoms of these types of injuries would be a temporary loss of vision or loss of function or temporary cognitive or neurological deficits in the brain.

Those all could be classified as secondary traumatic brain injuries and with secondary injuries, there is a lot more monitoring and testing done, but the doctors most likely will not take the drastic steps of attempting to induce a come or performing a procedure called a window which is cutting out a portion of the skull in an effort to release some pressure on the brain inside the skull.

How Are Secondary Brain Injuries Treated?

Mild traumatic brain injuries are secondary traumatic injuries.  They are sustained pretty much the same way as a primary traumatic brain injury except that the force or impact that hits the skull of the brain is much less severe and so there is less of an impact upon the skull and brain, even though there is less of an impact they can still cause some lasting and dangerous and severe effects to someone. These injuries are diagnosed in the same way as the primary traumatic brain injuries.

Anoxic Brain Injury

An anoxic brain injury is where there is a lack of oxygen and it can cause people to have cognitive deficits or problems and disabilities. If the brain loses oxygen, it won’t be able to function and can show a lapse or spasm and cause very severe injury.  One of the ways we lose oxygen to the brain is from drowning or from suffocation, either by being trapped in a room or space with no oxygen, or succumbing to fumes in a confined space. This can even occur if someone applies a choke hold to someone. These injuries can have horrible ramifications and can likely result in death.  So those injuries need to be treated immediately in an effort to try to save a person with anoxic brain injury.

Hypoxic Brain Injuries

Hypoxia is similar in that it involves a deprivation of oxygen to the brain, but where anoxic injury is the total deprivation of oxygen to the brain, hypoxic injuries involve a lower level of oxygen than normal being received by the brain. It is less severe, but they’re very similar and can cause the same effects. A hypoxic is a reduction in the oxygen supply to the brain where an anoxic one is a complete loss of it and it’s very important because the brain would consume 20% of the body’s oxygen supply.

These types of injuries can be quite dangerous as a Brain injury can occur quite quickly if there is any lack of oxygen or a lower level of oxygen. Hypoxic brain injuries can result in severe consequences for people who sustain them and can even result in death.

Importance of Working With An Attorney For a TBI Injury

The difference in working with a personal injury attorney who has experience in these cases is that an experienced attorney can identify the potential injury early on and review the records to ensure that the person that sustained the injury is receiving the proper care and that the proper tests are being ordered and conducted.

Some people can recognize a traumatic brain injury, but they don’t know what doctors to have monitored or what rehab or people to point them to.  Most doctors will tell the patient where to go.  They will refer you to a certain type of specialist, but if there is any lack of treatment or gap in the treatment, then an attorney can help put the client back on to a course of treatment for their injuries—kind of pick up the slack and advise a client where they should resume treatment