Children Suffer Long Term Effects After Head Trauma

According to a new study, children who have had a concussion or other traumatic brain injury are more likely to develop severe headaches for up to a year, more so than children with any other bodily injury.

Horseplay and rough housing are a leading factor in head injuries among kids. More than half a million children go to the hospital each year for head injuries. Because there is a lack of treatment, results can lead to long-term problems, such as insomnia, headaches, lack of focus in school, the dropping out of extracurricular activities, and tempers.

Heidi Blume, of Seattle Children’s Research Institute, recently tracked the progress of kids that came into the emergency room with a brain injury. 402 were mild and 60 were severe. When comparing the patients to other children that came in with an arm injury, Blume’s team discovered that three months after the injury, 43 out of 100 with mild injuries complained of headaches, 37 out of 100 with severe injuries complained of headaches, and 26 out of 100 with arm injuries complained of headaches.

It is a startling conclusion. Children with mild brain injuries were more likely to have headaches than those who suffered severely. It is unclear as to why, but it has been noted in the past before. Barlow speculated that there might be something about the mild and severe trauma that interferes with the mechanisms of sensing pain in the brain, but researchers haven’t gotten to the bottom yet.
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Another thing that was discovered was that the risk for having headaches after a head injury was especially pronounced among girls than boys. Girls with a mild injury were more than twice as likely to have headaches regardless of the type of injury. Blume stated that girls might be more likely to speak up about their headaches, but doesn’t think it can all be chalked up to that, there’s something else going on.

After all, women are more likely to suffer migraines than men, which might be due to hormone levels and perhaps hormones play a role with headaches after head trauma too.

There are few ways to treat children suffering from headaches after head trauma. No studies to guide treatments of post-traumatic headaches in children have happened, which usually results in the doctor telling the parent to offer rest and hydration.