Abstract
Severe head injury is a major cause of death by traffic accident in Japan. Unfortunately, we don't have any comprehensive data that describes the status of traffic death or severe head injury in Japan from a medical point of view. We conducted an epidemiologic study on the medical treatment administered for traumatic head injury from January, 1998 to June, 2000. We made original data sheets with 392 items containing information about the characteristics of the injury, pre-hospital care, diagnosis, treatment and follow-up information concerning outcome. Patients with severe head injury were eligible for entry with a Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) score of 8 or less. Patients who underwent craniotomy were also included. Children under 5 years old were excluded. Ten neurosurgical emergency centers took part in our project. In the end of 2000, 721 patients were enrolled as eligible out of 811. 442 patients were victims of traffic accidents. In the multi-center study, collection, integration and analysis of data required great effort. Difficulties in the collection of follow-up data concerning outcome requires further discussion. We are still in a preliminary stage for this clinical study. We hope that our project will explain in part the actual circumstances of severe head injuries in Japan and that our report will present significant data to be used in an international comparative survey.
