[Prognosis of childhood brain injuries in relation to acute post-traumatic syndrome].
Long-time follow-up examinations of 196 children, who had been suffering from severe and moderately severe cerebral traumata, gave abundant proof of the view that neurological disorders occurring at the age of childhood are characterized by a positive development of the disease, a view that is held by all authors. Cerebral ailments characterized by attacks usually manifest themselves within one year after the accident. The younger the children at the time of accident, the higher the number of posttraumatic diseases characterized by attacks. Children with convulsive phenomena in the acute posttraumatic phase usually show a greater tendency toward later diseases characterized by attacks. Every fourth child with initial convulsions and every seventh child without such an early symptomatology suffered from attacks in the further course of disease. Four out of 32 children were, in spite of careful treatment, not free from attacks after 10 years from the accident. The younger a child is at the time of accident the more unfavorable is the prognosis as regards personality development, intelligence, and scholastic records. Also, there is a clear dependence upon the severity of the cerebral trauma. Most pronounced permanent handicaps were observed in young children with severe cerebral traumata. A posttraumatic ailment characterized by attacks tends to worsen any prognosis.