This academic research volume explores non-accidental head injury in babies and young children, covering medical, social, and legal aspects of this phenomenon, as well as the responsibilities of professionals, child protection agencies and the media in this area.

Highly acclaimed in its first edition and thoroughly revised and expanded in this second edition, this volume uses an interdisciplinary approach and covers trauma to each body region, pyschosocial considerations, normal variants, disease simulating abuse, congenital malformations, dating fractures, and much more. This edition contains a heavier emphasis on MRI, expanded discussion of differential diagnosis, expanded legal issues and the addition of recent scientific work relevant to diagnosing child abuse.

Sports concussions make headlines, but you don't have to be an NFL star to suffer traumatic brain injury. In Shaken Brain, Elizabeth Sandel, MD, shares stories and research from her decades treating and studying brain injuries. She explains what concussions do to our bodies, how to avoid them, and how to recover.

Clinics in Developmental Medicine No. 162 The Research Programme on Shaken Baby Syndrome in Edinburgh is internationally recognised for its prominent ongoing research into the epidemiology, bio-mechanics, primary and secondary brain insults, neuroradiological aspects, medical-social aspects, and neurodevelopmental and neuropsychometric sequelae of shaking a baby. In this book, a highly distinguished team of experts from the programme present the clinician with the latest findings on the syndrome, covering the diagnosis of the syndrome itself and the long-term disability that results which, unlike other forms of child abuse associated with psychological scars, is also associated with a high degree of life-long physical and intellectual disability. This will be invaluable reading for all professionals concerned with diagnosing and treating this syndrome.

I was gratified by the most favorable reception and wide usage received by the first edition of this book. A decade seems to be a short period for a book on pathology, and yet it witnessed many important changes of concepts, along with a formidable growth of knowledge. The second edition required extensive reorganization. There are new chapters on mitochondriopathies, on peroxisomal diseases and on spongy myelino pathies. Major revisions and new additions were necessary in many chapters, for instance those on the dysplasias of the cerebral and of the cerebellar hemispheres, which were largely reorganized. The chapters on perinatal pathology were reordered and reorganized to give a more logical sequence of prenatal, perinatal and postnatal lesions. The entire text was worked over for brevity. A wealth of new references was added with the. aim of staying abreast with the literature up to summer 1988. All refer ences were double checked for errors. My gratitude goes to Mrs. Gisela Ropte and Mrs. Cynthia Bunker for their untiring, diligent help. As a result, this second edition is an essentially rewritten text. Advance in the prevention of human suffering is based on a thorough understand ing of the nature of disease. I hope that this text will continue to be of service in this behalf. Perhaps it may also reflect and foster the intellectual curiosity which makes the "reading of brains" so interesting an occupation. Gottingen, 1989 Reinhard L.

Nonaccidental head injury in children (NAHI), most often due to abusive head trauma (AHT), is not uncommon and carries a high risk of mortality and morbidity. Intracranial lesions encountered are mainly subdural hematomas. Despite heterogeneous clinical presentation, symptoms are related to brain edema with intracranial hypertension and/or seizures that should prompt early diagnosis and treatment. Two main differential diagnoses are glutaric aciduria type 1 and Menkes disease, two inborn errors of metabolism that require specific diagnostic procedures and treatment. The aim of emergency treatment is to control seizures, prevent seizure recurrence, and decrease intracranial pressure. Because NAHI/AHT carries a worse prognosis than accidental head traumatism – with specific risk factors such as initial clinical status, age, aspect of initial CT scan, associated retinal hemorrhage, seizure recurrence – these children need close clinical, neurological, and radiological monitoring in neurointensive care units. It is therefore important to identify the nonaccidental origin of the injury at the earliest opportunity so that the appropriate intervention, including social evaluation and reporting suspected cases to judicial authorities, can be made to protect the child from further harm.