Brain injury is the consequence of a sudden injury to the brain. This produces physical, cognitive, emotional and/or behavioral alterations in the person who suffers it.
What are the causes of brain injury?
Some of the most frequent causes of brain injury are:
- Craniocerebral trauma due to traffic accident, work accident or sports accident.
- Strokes or cerebrovascular accidents caused by an interruption of the blood supply system. It can happen due to the occlusion of an artery, such as embolisms and thrombosis, or due to the rupture of a blood vessel, including rupture of aneurysms or malformations of the veins and arteries that irrigate the brain.
- Anoxias or hypoxias are caused by the lack of oxygen in the brain for a certain period of time. This causes neuronal death of part of the brain tissue.
- Both brain tumors and their treatments can cause damage to the surrounding brain tissue.
- Infectious processes such as meningitis or encephalitis.
How does brain damage manifest itself?
Brain damage can affect different areas of human functioning. The deficits will depend on the type, area and severity of the injury. These alterations can be grouped into:
- Physical motor deficits affecting the ability to stand, movement, tremors, lack of sensitivity, etc.
- Cognitive and learning deficits understood as language alterations, thought alterations and alterations in the regulation of purposeful behavior.
- Alterations in communication producing the inability for oral expression and/or comprehension, such as dysphasia or aphasia. In some cases there may be an exclusive alteration of the articulation of language, of variable intensity, without alteration in the expression or comprehension of the same.
- Behavioral and/or emotional alterations that can respond to two mechanisms: lack of inhibition or, on the contrary, excess. In addition, at the emotional level it is likely that the person suffers from irritability, impatience and explosions of anger, or shows depression, discouragement or emotional lability.
Neurorehabilitation treatment for brain injury
The period of specialized rehabilitation begins when the brain-injured patient is discharged from the hospital.
The treatment aims to achieve the recovery of the neurological damage to the greatest extent possible, as well as the functional capacity of the patient. All this should be done in the shortest possible time, which will facilitate their independence and reintegration into their family, social and work environment.
For the treatment to be effective, four fundamental characteristics must be taken into account:
- Do not delay the start of treatment since there is a period of time in which recovery is greater, which means that the sooner treatment is started, the fewer sequelae will remain. The greatest degree of improvement is seen during the first three months of treatment, and after six months a functional recovery can be observed. In some cases, this rehabilitation can be beneficial up to one year after the brain injury.
- Intensive therapies decrease the degree of disability by ensuring maximum therapeutic activity.
- Treatment should be individualized with goals and intervention plans. In addition, the process should be evaluated periodically.
- Neurological disorders have to be addressed in an organized manner and following the advice of professionals working together for a common goal; neurologist, physiotherapist, neuropsychologist, speech therapist and occupational therapist.
The duration of this process is variable and depends on two fundamental factors:
- The degree of neurological damage, since the greater the damage the worse the recovery will be.
- The evolution of the patient during the treatment.
Periodic check-ups are recommended every 6 months for patients who have some degree of disability. In this way it will be possible to detect early the appearance of functional deterioration.