Journal
YONSEI MEDICAL JOURNAL
Volume 45, Issue 2, Pages 229-232Publisher
YONSEI UNIV COLL MEDICINE
DOI: 10.3349/ymj.2004.45.2.229
Keywords
fall; head injury; age; height of fall; Glasgow Coma Scale
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Falls are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality among children. We performed a retrospective analysis of pediatric patients under 7 years of age admitted to our department after a fall from January 1994 through December 1999 to describe the characteristics of fall-related head injury and to determine the clinical parameters influencing outcome. The patients were divided into two groups according to age: group I(babies and toddlers, 0-3 years) and group II(preschool children, 4-6 years). Falls were classified as low and high level. Sixty-eight cases were identified and falls accounted for 35.2% of head injuries. There were more boys than girls, and more low-level falls(LLF) than high-level falls (HLF), particularly in group i. Although more common in HLF, significant intracranial injuries were also sustained from LLF. Calvarial fractures were the most frequent type of head injury and were more common in LLF than HLE Admission Glasgow Coma Scale score, types of head injury and hypoxia on admission were significantly correlated with Glasgow Outcome Scale score, but age, sex, extracranial injury and height of fall did not influence clinical outcome. From this study, we concluded that the height of fall should not limit the evaluation of patients and that aggressive management is mandatory to improve outcome even in patients with poor prognostic factors.
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