Pediatric traumatic brain injury: Neuroimaging and neurorehabilitation outcome

Brain injury in the pediatric patient not only occurs in an immature brain, but potentially influences all subsequent brain and neurodevelopmental maturation. This presents unique challenges in neuroimaging the developing central nervous system, which is reviewed herein. The most significant neuroimaging advances in assessing pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI) have occurred with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), particularly diffusion tensor imaging and the multiple emerging techniques using functional MRI (fMRI). Pediatric neuroimaging findings of TBI are discussed in terms of techniques that can assess underlying neural networks and provide information about neuroplasticity of recovery. Neuroimaging methods also provide insights into the complexities of brain injury, cognitive and neurobehavioral recovery, and how multimodality contemporary neuroimaging methods best demonstrate underlying neuropathology that affects outcome.