Characteristics and Outcomes of Traumatic Head Injuries in Hail Region, Saudi Arabia – Hospital Based Study

Abstract

Background: Head injury is one of the most common causes of death following trauma worldwide. Epidemiological data of traumatic head injuries (THI) is important for establishing prevention program. Such data are few in our region. For that reason our primary goal was to study the descriptive features and outcomes of THI among adult patients presented at King Khalid General Hospital in Hail, Saudi Arabia. Methods: A hospital-based, retrospective, cross-sectional study was conducted at King Khalid General Hospital in Hail, Saudi Arabia. All patients who were admitted with THI, from April 2016 to April 2017 were identified through a trauma database, which includes cases that required hospital admission or died in the emergency department. The records of 89 patients were reviewed. Characteristics of patients and injury-related data were obtained. The data were entered into Excel sheet and exported to SPSS version 20 statistical package for further analysis. Descriptive statistics were used to explore the data in relation to relevant variables. Binary logistic regression analysis was employed. Odds ratio with 95% confidence intervals (CI) was computed to identify relations between the variables. Results: We reviewed the records of 89 adult patients met the inclusion criteria with a mean age of 29.6 years and a male predominance of 93.1%. Most injuries were secondary to motor vehicle collisions (MVC; 71.2%). Only 10.7% of patients had a severe THI (Glasgow coma score, GCS < 8). The overall mortality rate was 21%. Mortality was significantly associated with older age (P=0.0001) and lower GCS (P=0.0001). Outcome was good in majority of patients (88.5%). Conclusion: This study indicated that outcome of THI is affected by age and GCS of patients.