WHAT IS POST-TRAUMATIC AMNESIA?
The next stage in the recovery from head injury is called POST-TRAUMATIC AMNESIA. Coming out of coma is not just waking up as people often imagine. Rather, it is most often a gradual process of regaining contact with the world. One of the most striking things about recovery of conscioiusness is that it take so long to begin to restore memory. The kind of memory that is most often affected is the ability to continuously remember the events of the day. When head injured people are awake but unable to recall what happened jsut a hew hours, or even minues ago, this state called POST-TRAUMATIC AMNESIA. People who are fully recovered from a head injury usually have no memory at all of this stage of their recovery.
Post traumatic amnesia is very important is assessing the seriousness of the head injury. Elicit this by asking the patient. Questions asked by nursing staff – orientated in time and space? are often rubbish. It may take a long time to extract duration of PTA – Check very carefully. Get a series of snap shots of memory of the events after the accident. Still frames embedded forever, flash back memory does not change. Looking for the length of time it takes for day to day continuous memory to re-establish itself. A minor head injury is where there is no post traumatic amnesia or where the post traumatic amnesia is less than 24 hours.
