A case of headbanging-associated chronic subdural hematoma in a young man

Abstract

Although chronic subdural hematomas usually affect elderly individuals, they sometimes affect young individuals. We present a case of 19-year-old male with a chronic subdural hematoma that occurred because of previous headbanging. During a rock concert, the patient was intensely headbanging, after which he experienced persisting headache, and his symptoms gradually deteriorated. He visited our hospital for a chief complaint of a headache. Brain CT revealed a right subdural hematoma, and he was urgently admitted. He was treated with emergency surgical drainage with a mass of hematoma. His postoperative status was pretty fair, and he was dis­charged on hospital day 8. Follow-up brain MRI showed an arachnoid cyst in the right frontal lobe, and the cyst was considered to be the cause of hematoma. To date, only two cases of headbanging-associated chronic subdural hematoma have been reported in western countries. To our knowledge, our patient is the first Japanese case.