What should I do if my child hits his head?

1 Babies up to the year

Quite often babies roll down from the tables, where they are swaddled, so the procedure is better performed in a more secure place, for example, on the couch. It is necessary to foresee a possible fall and spread a carpet near the sofa.

There are also a few simple rules to follow:

• keep the eye out of the toddler during swaddling;
• hold it with your hands and do not let it fall;
• if you urgently need to depart for any reason, it is better to take the baby with him, as he can roll onto his stomach and fall.

2 The child is older than the age of

. For safety, a child needs to buy socks in which there are inserts in the sole made of rubber, they reduce slip, and the child will not fall on a slippery parquet floor. It is recommended to spread the mats in the children's room. In addition, it is desirable to wrap the cloth around the sharp corners of all furniture and door jambs. It is necessary to remove the chairs or table from the window, so that the kid could not climb up the sill.

3 If the child falls

If the child falls and bumped his head, do not panic immediately, you need to concentrate on monitoring the consequences of the injury.

If the trauma of an easy degree and the brain is not affected in any way, the child can see only an abrasion or a small cone. The baby cries for half an hour, then calms down and behaves in the usual way. In this case, there is no need to consult a doctor.

If a brain concussion occurs, the child may experience such processes as loss of consciousness, vomiting( up to 3 months old), pale skin, cold sweat. The child's appetite worsens, drowsiness and lethargy appear. If he is older, he can complain of headache and tinnitus.

One of the most serious injuries is a brain contusion. In such a situation, the child can lose consciousness for a long time( more than 1 hour), there may be irregularities in the work of the respiratory and cardiac systems.

If the child has a fracture of the skull, you can notice blood from the nose or ear, and bruises can also form around the eyes. Such symptoms appear a few hours after the fall.

The most important rule is to follow closely the behavior of your child after an injury. If you have doubts about his positive state of health, you should consult a doctor.

4 What can I do by myself?

If serious damage to the skull is not present, a cloth that is moistened with cold water should be applied to the impact site, and ice can also be wrapped in a rag. This procedure helps to reduce pain, stop bleeding and reduces swelling.

Bleeding can be stopped by another method - attach a dense piece of dry clean tissue to the sore spot. If it bleeds, then add another layer of matter and hold for 15 minutes. If the bleeding does not stop after the time has elapsed, the doctor should be called immediately.

After the injury, no matter how much it is, the child should be kept calm, but for an hour not letting him sleep, to know exactly what consequences he has after the fall.

If the child is unconscious after the injury, the ambulance is already on the way, then it should be put on his side so that the vomit does not penetrate the respiratory system. If there is a suspicion that, except for the head, the child has a spinal injury( for example, when falling from a height), then it must be turned very carefully so as not to cause additional trauma.

When a child comes into the family, adults must constantly monitor all his actions and take care of him. In our life, very often there are cases when a child falls out of a stroller, his bed, etc., while receiving a brain injury. It is necessary to provide all possible variants of the outcome of the events and to ensure that the child does not bump his head against heavy objects.

Such injuries are of two types: open and closed. Open means damage to the meninges. When the hard shell is broken, the injury is called penetrating. In such a situation, the child's brain is under great threat. Infection is possible, which will make the child's state heavier. Closed craniocerebral trauma carries with it easier consequences, since the head cover remains intact.

Closed injuries are of 3 degrees of difficulty: light, medium and heavy. To determine the severity, it is necessary to use the Glasgow coma scale. If the child on such a scale received from 13 to 15 points, the trauma is mild, if from 9 to 12, then the degree is average, and if from 3 to 8, then the degree is complex.

First of all, you need to turn to a child traumatologist, a neuropathologist and a neurosurgeon. If you do not use specialists in time, the child may have a coma, the risk of a fatal outcome increases. Injuries of severe form are treated exclusively in the hospital.

To diagnose a traumatic brain injury, it is necessary to pass a neurosonography. During this study, the structure of the brain is examined. This method is applied to the patient from 1 to 1.5 years.

Another popular method of research is computed tomography. Thanks to X-rays, the specialist receives an image of the necessary part of the body( in this case, the head).

For diagnosis, it is customary to use a method such as magnetic resonance imaging. The principle of its action lies in the ability of atoms, when surrounded by their magnetic field, to absorb energy, and then, after the impulse ceases, energy is radiated. This method does not do any harm and is one of the most informative.

5 Treatment and consequences of craniocerebral trauma

The specialist, after the diagnosis is delivered, prescribes treatment with medications.

It includes drugs that help to eliminate cerebral edema, help reduce intracranial pressure, adjust metabolism, etc.

Improve cerebral blood flow using drugs such as Cavinton, Complamine, etc. Strengthen the vessel wall using ascorbic acid,and the normalization of vascular tone will cope with Reserpine or Raunatin, which appoints only a specialist in the correct dosage.

If the injury is a mild form, all the doctor's recommendations have been followed, then after recovery there can sometimes be only a feeling of fatigue and irritability. The child becomes a bit inhibited, there is a tendency to repeat the injury. Such phenomena may in the future cause disruptions in its intellectual development.

The mortality rate for such injuries is rather high and reaches 30%.After them, children often have irregularities in the functioning of the organs of the musculoskeletal system, there are deviations in the psyche, in the future the child can become disabled.

If there was an open form of injury, inflammation of the brain envelopes may occur, this process usually ends in death.

6 Prevention of child injuries

In infancy, all actions of the child should be constantly monitored. In the game form, you need to explain to him how to protect yourself and what you can not do.

If the child is engaged in any sports section, he should follow the instructions of his safety trainer.

In winter, the child can slip and fall on ice, so parents should provide him with quality footwear with a reliable protector.

It is not recommended for a child to dive into the sea from the pier, as he may get a head injury if solid or sharp objects lie on the bottom.

Parents should not leave an unaccompanied child in any situation, as long as he is prone to injury.