You might have heard the abbreviation “TBI” before. It stands for traumatic brain injury. These injuries can be pretty serious, and there are several different ways that you can sustain one.
In this article, we’ll cover a few basic TBI facts, so you’ll know more about these injuries and what can happen if someone suffers one.
They Happen More Frequently than You Might Realize
The first thing about TBIs that’s worth knowing is that more of them happen than you might imagine. 150 people die each day from TBI-related injuries.
These individuals can be of any age. You might have a teenager who dies from a TBI or an older adult.
Because of how widespread they are, you need to take precautions to protect your head when you’re out and about in the world. Even if you’re not doing anything that seems dangerous, stumbling on an uneven sidewalk is sometimes all that it takes to sustain one.
There Are Some Common Ways that They Occur
While many activities or events can cause a TBI, certain ones make this outcome a lot more likely. For instance, contact sports frequently cause TBIs. You could include football, baseball, soccer, hockey, and others in that category.
You might suffer a TBI if you slip or trip and fall. That can happen when you’re walking down the street, in a store, or on a job site. If a TBI occurs when you’re on the job, you can often get insurance compensation to pay for the resulting medical bills, lost wages, etc.
A car crash might cause you to suffer a TBI. You might sustain one in a T-bone car crash, a sideswipe collision, or a head-to-head wreck.
If something falls on you, that might cause a traumatic brain injury. Any time that your head collides with a hard object or one that’s traveling at a high velocity, a TBI is likely.
Concussions are TBIs, But Not All TBIs are Concussions
You might wonder about concussions, especially if you watch a sport like professional football, where they happen all the time. Are concussions TBIs, and are they the same thing?
A concussion is a TBI form, meaning that if you sustain one, a doctor will note on your chart that you suffered a TBI and treat you accordingly. However, just because you suffered a TBI does not necessarily mean you sustained a concussion.
For instance, you might fracture your skull if you trip and fall. If that happens, medical science will consider the injury a TBI, but it’s not a concussion. TBIs can be more or less serious depending on the injury extent, just as concussions can be.
TBIs Can Cause Ongoing Health Issues
One other thing about TBIs you should understand is that you can injure different parts of your brain when you sustain one. How well you’ll continue to live and function after that will depend mainly on what parts of the brain you injured and how severely.
For instance, you might damage the part of the brain that allows you to speak and form complete, coherent sentences. You might damage the part that helps you to understand language.
You could damage the section that allows you to walk, drive, ride a bike, etc. You could damage the part that enables you to see, hear, taste, or smell.
Brain function is so critical, and even slight damage to it can impact your life dramatically. You might be able to recover from a TBI in time, or you could suffer lifelong damage that no amount of medical intervention or treatment can repair.
A TBI Can Kill You
One final thing about TBIs that’s worth knowing is that if you suffer one that is severe enough, it can put you in a coma, or it can kill you. The tricky thing about TBIs is that if you don’t get medical attention fast enough after sustaining one, that can be what ultimately causes your tragic demise.
Any time you can determine that you hurt your head and something is dramatically wrong, you can at least seek medical attention as quickly as possible. If you’re in a violent collision on a football field or in a car, though, you might not realize the damage, especially if you can’t immediately see the results.
If you even suspect that you’ve hit your head with any force, it’s always best for a doctor to check you out as fast as possible. That can save your life.