Mild blows 'unwire' the brain

While people with acquired brain injuries following a serious blow to the head almost always show symptoms of being affected, those who only suffer a minor knock could have sustained more damage than originally thought.

Memory, attention, and brain function can all be affected by a traumatic brain injury (TBI), and despite some people who have suffered a smaller impact to the head reporting no symptoms six months after the incident, researchers have found that connections in the brain are often damaged.

Dr Marilyn Kraus, associate professor of psychiatry and neurology at the University of Illinois (UIC) and lead author of the study published the findings of an imaging study in the medical journal Brain.

"We studied patients with all severities of traumatic brain injury - mild to severe - and found that abnormalities in white matter existed on the spectrum," Dr Kraus said. "Even in patients with mild TBI - those identified as having minimal or no loss of consciousness - there were structural deficits."

Researchers looked at the brains of 20 patients who had suffered mild TBI, 17 with moderate to severe TBI and 18 healthy volunteers, testing memory, attention, and executive function, all of whom were functioning in society.

They discovered that even people who had suffered even a small blow to the head suffered damage to the connections that effectively 'wire up' the brain.

Deborah Little, from the department of neurology and rehabilitation medicine at UIC and co-author of the study, compared the structure to a computer. "You have the CPU and the memory, but they are worthless unless they are connected to each other," she explained.

"The white matter of the brain has the same function as the cables of the computer. When white matter is damaged, areas of the brain may appear healthy but they are actually 'unplugged' and cannot function."


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