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Complications and sequelae after brain injury
Last reviewed: 04.07.2025

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Many patients who have suffered severe traumatic brain injury remain disabled due to mental disorders, memory loss, movement disorders, speech disorders, post-traumatic epilepsy and other causes.
Complications of traumatic brain injury are quite diverse, their nature largely depends on the type of TBI, and they can be conditionally divided into the following groups:
Purulent-inflammatory craniocerebral complications
- suppuration of the soft tissues of the skull;
- meningitis;
- encephalitis (meningoencephalitis);
- ventriculitis;
- brain abscess (early and late);
- osteomyelitis;
- post-traumatic empyema (epi- or subdural);
- sinus thrombosis and thrombosis of intracranial veins;
- post-traumatic granulomas;
- late prolapse of the brain.
Non-inflammatory craniocerebral complications
- early brain prolapse;
- early epilepsy syndrome and epileptic state;
- dislocation syndromes;
- non-purulent thrombosis of venous sinuses;
- cerebral thromboembolism, cerebral infarction;
- brain collapse;
- liquorrhea.
Extracranial complications after traumatic brain injury
- shock;
- DIC syndrome;
- pneumonia;
- gastrointestinal bleeding;
- acute cardiovascular failure, heart rhythm disturbance.
The consequences of traumatic brain injury are also quite varied, and may be based on atrophic processes in the brain, inflammatory changes in its membranes, disturbances in cerebrospinal fluid and blood circulation, and a number of others.
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Consequences of traumatic brain injury
- post-traumatic arachnoiditis (adhesive, cystic, adhesive-cystic; diffuse, convexital, basal, subtentorial, focal, "spotted", optochiasmal);
- hydrocephalus;
- pneumocephalus;
- pornocephaly;
- skull defects;
- skull deformation;
- cerebrospinal fluid fistula;
- cranial nerve damage, as well as central paresis and paralysis;
- meningeal scars;
- brain atrophy (diffuse, local);
- cysts (subarachnoid, intracerebral);
- epilepsy;
- carotid-cavernous anastomosis;
- ischemic brain damage;
- arterial aneurysms of cerebral vessels;
- parkinsonism;
- mental and autonomic dysfunctions.
Complications in the form of amnesia, decreased performance, persistent headaches, autonomic and endocrine disorders can be observed in a large number of patients who have suffered mild to moderate TBI.
Traumatic brain injury, the consequences of which require surgical treatment: post-traumatic purulent complications (abscesses, empyemas), aresorptive hydrocephalus, carotid-cavernous fistulas, post-traumatic skull defects and a number of others,
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