Concussion – Overview

Transcript

“A topic that many people ask us about is concussions. We hear mostly about concussions most famously in the setting of sports like football, but in fact, they can happen to anyone, anytime. Simply put, a concussion is an injury to the brain that results from some sort of force that causes the brain to move about within the skull, which is a very hard surface. It can happen from a fall, from a blow to the head, or simply during a car crash or other significant energy producing event. If you go to see a physician during or after a concussion, you may or may not get a CAT scan or an MRI .imaging really doesn’t show the injury. It’s an injury to the brain at the level of the cell. People have variety of symptoms after concussions and many concussions present differently. Some people have symptoms immediately, and some people have symptoms on a delayed basis.

They can include headaches, nausea, confusion, concentration difficulties, or sleep difficulties, or some irritability sometimes. These can last for a period of days to weeks to months at times. The most important thing after concussion is resting of the brain, much like you rest any other body part that gets injured. For a student or a younger child, this can be time away from screens, to rest the eyes and to rest the brain, and time away from school. For an athlete, it’s time off the field. For an adult, it may be time away from work. It’s important if the symptoms are not getting better in a reasonable period of time, usually a week or so, perhaps 10 days, to see your physician, the physician may start you on a course of therapy, to include specialized therapy that may be prescribed by a concussion clinic in your area, a specialized service that can really provide great benefit to those to get you back to normal life.”