Soldiers can have completely normal CT and MRI scans, but may actually have head trauma, according to a recent story in the New York Times.
The New York Times reports that researchers using a highly sensitive type of magnetic resonance imaging on 63 servicemen wounded by explosions in Iraq or Afghanistan found that these troops had brain injuries that were too subtle to detect with either CT or MRI scans, according to the article.
A study by RAND Corporation in 2008 found that nearly 19 percent of the servicemen and servicewomen back from Iraq and Afghanistan said they suffered from possible traumatic brain injury while overseas, according to TruthDig.com.
The brain injury was described as “mild,” in the study and could have come from concussions, or a fall, or something else equally minor. The Washington Post reported that about 33 percent of Americans who served in either Iraq or Afghanistan and had brain injuries caused by bomb blasts showed immediate evidence of stretched and damaged nerve fibers at both the front and the back of the brain, according to a new study.
The study, reported in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), noted that questions remained about what exactly caused these brain injuries but that magnetic resonance imaging went a long way towards finding these “minor” insults to the brain, and that they needed to be treated. The study could not determine whether these injuries resulted from bomb blasts or a fall or an injury with a blunt instrument.
The NEJM study showed that follow-up scans on 47 of those who had tested positive for traumatic brain injury continued to show persistent abnormalities that were continuing to evolve, in the six to 12 months that followed enrollment in the trial.
According to MedPage.com, the NEJM study showed that neuron damage in explosion-related "mild" traumatic brain injuries can be more extensive than previously thought and just because it does not show up as a severe clinical symptom does not mean that it isn’t there.
Want to learn more about 4G wireless technologies? Then be sure to attend the 4GWE Conference, collocated with TMC’s ITEXPO West 2011, taking place Sept. 13-15, 2011, in Austin, Texas. The 4GWE Conference provides unmatched networking opportunities and a robust conference program representing the wireless ecosystem. The conference not only brings together the best and brightest in the wireless industry, it actually spans the communications and technology industry. To register, click here.
Deborah DiSesa Hirsch is an award-winning health and technology writer who has worked for newspapers, magazines and IBM in her 20-year career. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Jennifer Russell
