Open Journal of Clinical Diagnostics, 2013, 3, 109-114 OJCD http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojcd.2013.33019 Published Online September 2013 (http://www.scirp.org/journal/ojcd/ ) Significance of computed tomography scans in head injury Suryapratap Singh Tomar, Anuj Bhargava, Nikitha Reddy Narayana Medical College, Nellore, India Email: dr.suryapratap_singh_tomar@yahoo.com Received 7 July 2013; revised 8 August 2013; accepted 15 August 2013 Copyright © 2013 Suryapratap Singh Tomar et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ABSTRACT Background: In view of the growing population and increased vehicle use, traumatic brain injury is be- coming the most common and devastating problem especially in young healthy people. It has occupied second place next to cancer as leading cause of death. In this new era of radiology, computed tomography has become the primary modality of choice in the ini- tial assessment of head injury patients as it is widely available, faster and highly accurate in detecting skull fractures and acute intracranial hemorrhage. Aim: It is to demonstrate the importance of ct scanning in the initial treatment planning, follow up and long term management of patients with acute head injury of varying severity. Patients: A retrospective study has been carried out of 100 cases of acute head trauma with positive CT scanning referred to Narayana me- dical college and hospital, Nellore, India between 30 th April 2012 to 1 st May 2013 [1 year retrospective stu- dy]. Results: The post traumatic intracranial conse- quences have been collected, reviewed and analyzed, where in 82% of cases males were involved , and most of the injured people belong to the first three decades of life, the main cause being road traffic accident which is growing in incidence in this 21 st century. Most of the cases which were studied showed skull fractures, which indicates that there has been signifi- cant trauma and in a single case more than one pa- thology related to cranium has been seen. The most common post traumatic consequences found in the study of adults are contusions, brain edema and in- tracerebral hematomas, while other sequelae such as subarachnoid hematomas, subdural hematomas and extradural hematomas are encountered less. Diffuse and focal cerebral edema was being the most common pathology following trauma in children. Conclusion: CT scanning is the primary modality of choice in the diagnostic work up of patients with acute head trau- ma for identifying the various intracranial conse- quences following head injury especially within 48 hours which helps in the initial assessment, treatment planning, follow up and long term management of pa- tients. Keywords: Head Injury; CT Scanning; Hematoma 1. INTRODUCTION Trauma is a one of the most common cause of death and lifelong disability in the early decades of life of which majority of cases are neurological trauma [1]. Various literatures have estimated that nearly 1.6 mil- lion cranial injuries occur in the United States each year, resulting in over 50,000 - 60,000 deaths and over 70,000 - 80,000 patients with lifelong neurological deficits [2-4]. The diagnosis and management of head trauma have been changed significantly with the wide availability of ct scan since its inception in 1970s [1,2], this study demon- strates the importance of ct scan in acute head trauma, showing the different intracranial consequences and their frequencies have been correlated with age, sex, and the presence of a skull fracture [4,5]. 2. MATERIAL AND METHODS During a 12-month period, between 30 th April 2012 to1 st May 2013 [1 year retrospective study], randomly select- ed 100 cases of acute head trauma with positive CT scan findings are studied retrospectively. The ages are ranging from 1 to 69 years. In each case, the age, and sex of the patient, type of trauma, any asso- ciated fracture, and CT sequelae with their percentages are all documented. 3. RESULTS Out of 100 cases included in the study, 82 cases (82%) are males, while female cases are only 18 cases consti- tuting 18%. The age distribution is clarified in Figure 1. An associated fracture is documented in 70 cases OPEN ACCESS