An Epidemiological Study of Traumatic Head Injury in a Tertiary Care Center in Kancheepuram, Tamil Nadu, India

Introduction: Traumatic brain injury is a major public health problem in India. The severity of a traumatic brain injury may range from mild to severe. The increase in economic growth in India coupled with rise in population, motorization and industrialization has contributed to a significant increase in TBI with each advancing year. India having the highest rate of head injury in the world. In India more than 100000 lives are lost every year with over 1 million suffering from serious head injury.

Objectives: To assess the risk factors among for head injury cases and assess the outcome of the traumatic brain injury patients.

Materials and Methods: A cross sectional Study conducted among all patients with traumatic head injury attending tertiary care centre and those admitted in intensive care unit with the history of traumatic head injury for the duration of one year (August 2016 to July 2017). Data was collected through questionnaire, hospital records and collected from patients. Data Collected was entered in MS office excel and analyzed in SPSS version 21.

Results: Totally 295 cases were reported with history of traumatic brain injury, out of which 82.7% were males and 17.3% were females. Road traffic accidents was the most common cause for TBI 86.4%. Most of the patient was between the age group of 21-40 (51.5%). Most of the cases were from rural areas 55.3%. Based on GCS 49.5%, 28.5% and 22.0% patients had mild, moderate and severe injury respectively. 44.7% injuries occurred between the time period 04.00PM to 12.00AM.

Conclusion: This study revealed that most traumatic head injury occur due to Road traffic accident stressing the urgent need to create awareness and conduct health education about prevention of traumatic head injury.