Tai Chi, Qigong Interventions for Adult Diagnosed with Traumatic Brain Injury

Tai Chi, Qigong Interventions for Adult Diagnosed with Traumatic Brain Injury

Traumatic Brain Injury in Adults

One of the major causes of a brain injury is head trauma. In addition, the seriousness of the brain injury depends on the nature of the head trauma. At the time of the injury, there can be a severe damage to the neurones and tearing of the blood vessels, which can lead to the formation of haemorrhage and haematoma. Such a formation can result in the increasing of intracranial pressure (ICP) and compromising flow of blood to the cerebral tissues. At the initial stage, the decreasing consciousness of the patient indicates the rising ICP (Dolan & Holt, 2005). Injuries to the head injury can cause brain injuries at the primary and secondary level. Injuries that occur initially are the primary damages. On the other hand, secondary damages are those, which occur due to hypoxia (Dolan & Holt, 2005). Mild trauma brain injury results in unconsciousness up to 1 hour after the injury, complaining of headache, nausea and vomiting. Neurological status observed rhythmic twitching of the eye when viewed from the side (nystagmus), meningeal signs, asymmetry of reflexes. Radiographs may reveal broken bones of the cranial vault.

The management of severe brain trauma in A & E mostly depends on the prevention of secondary brain injuries (O'Shea, 2005). Evidence-based guidelines provided by the National Institute of Clinical Excellence deal with the management of patients who suffer head injuries. The guidelines provide recommendation pertaining to the neurological examination. According to the guidelines, the examination needs to document baseline levels of consciousness by the use of 15 point GCS. This is a standardized procedure for the assessment of consciousness levels on the basis of physical, eye sight, and verbal response. Moreover, the procedure aims to determine immediately if a patient shows improvement in neurological condition. The assessment also indentifies if the condition remains the same or deteriorates. The determination of consciousness level commonly takes place through GCS. GCS is considered as a worldwide recognized assessment of the modern time (Resuscitation Council, 2011).

Treatment of traumatic brain injuries can be divided into two stages. Stage one is of first aid and the stage of providing quality health care in the hospital is the second stage. If there is an episode with loss of consciousness the patient regardless of its current state needs transportation to a hospital. This is due to the high potential risk of severe life-threatening complications. After admission, the patient undergoes clinical examination. Then a series of diagnostic measures are taken to check the integrity of the skeleton of the skull bone and the presence of intracranial hematomas and other damages to the brain tissues.

The simplest method of diagnosis is radiography of the skull, but due to the peculiarities of the effectiveness of this method is it's relatively high even with the use of special equipment; approximately 20-30% of the skull bones are unavailable to ...