This Made My Brain Swell: Trauma Week Day 3

Our speaker today worked in the pediatric intensive care unit. They see patients from ages of 2 days old to 19 years old. Today was more scary than anything because we learned how quickly a human can lose their "value". A traumatic brain injury or submersion injury involving drowning can cause your brain to swell. After your submersion if you can breathe off of room air for 7 hours then you are good to go home, but if you need a breathing tube after any of that time then you must go to the ICU. The most important thing considering your survival is how long you went with out a pulse. If your pulse came back at the scene you will most likely live with decent continued quality but if it didn't you have a much higher chance of brain death. If your down for 20 minutes then it is considered devastating. When your brain dies is when it swells so big that blood can't get to it. Getting injured in a submersion event is different then just getting hit in the head. This is because getting hit in the head damages one part of the brain but getting submerged damages the whole brain. After the event the doctor is trying to keep your brain at low pressure. That means draining enough fluid out of your head to keep it at low pressure but not dehydrate you. There are some quick fixes like hyperventilating a patient, to adjust their carbon dioxide level, but if that goes on for too long then it will cause a stroke invoking more brain drama. Essentially this situation is very dire and your outcome will be known in 3-4 days sometimes a week. During this lecture the idea of the difference between surviving and living was stressed. A story was told about a boy our speaker saved at 3 years old and now at the age of 16 all he can do is blink. This boy gets acutely sick and it's to the point of where if he gets to sick his family has told the doctors not to resuscitate the body. The idea that falling in a pool at the age of 3 can hinder you for the rest of your life is quite a mentally grueling one. Today was understandable but really sad.