A systematic review of cross-sectional differences and longitudinal changes to the morphometry of the brain following paediatric traumatic brain injury

Abstract

Paediatric traumatic brain injury (pTBI) is a leading cause of disability for children and young adults. Children are a uniquely vulnerable group with the disease process that occurs following a pTBI interacting with the trajectory of normal brain development. Quantitative MRI post-injury has suggested a long-term, neurodegenerative effect of TBI on the morphometry of the brain, in both adult and childhood TBI. Changes to the brain beyond that of anticipated, age-dependant differences may allow us to estimate the state of the brain post-injury and produce clinically relevant predictions for long-term outcome. The current review synthesises the existing literature to assess whether, following pTBI, the morphology of the brain exhibits either i) longitudinal change and/or ii) differences compared to healthy controls and outcomes. The current literature suggests that morphometric differences from controls are apparent cross-sectionally at both acute and late-chronic timepoints post-injury, thus suggesting a non-transient effect of injury. Developmental trajectories of morphometry are altered in TBI groups compared to patients, and it is unlikely that typical maturation overcomes damage post-injury, or even ‘catches up’ with that of typically-developing peers. However, there is limited evidence for diverted developmental trajectories being associated with cognitive impairment post-injury. The current review also highlights the apparent challenges to the existing literature and potential methods by which these can be addressed.

Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nicl.2019.101844
Divisions: College of Health & Life Sciences > School of Psychology
College of Health & Life Sciences
College of Health & Life Sciences > Clinical and Systems Neuroscience
College of Health & Life Sciences > Aston Institute of Health & Neurodevelopment (AIHN)
Additional Information: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) Funding: This work was supported by a European Research Council (ERC) - Consolidator Grant (ERC-CoG) to AW [grant number 682734].
Uncontrolled Keywords: Brain development,Morphometry,Paediatric,TBI,Traumatic brain injury,Radiology Nuclear Medicine and imaging,Neurology,Clinical Neurology,Cognitive Neuroscience
Publication ISSN: 2213-1582
Last Modified: 26 Feb 2024 08:30
Date Deposited: 02 May 2019 08:14
Full Text Link:
Related URLs: https://www.sci ... 1949?via%3Dihub (Publisher URL)
http://www.scop ... tnerID=8YFLogxK (Scopus URL)
PURE Output Type: Review article
Published Date: 2019-05-01
Published Online Date: 2019-04-30
Accepted Date: 2019-04-29
Authors: King, Daniel (ORCID Profile 0000-0001-5797-9203)
Ellis, Katherine
Seri, Stefano (ORCID Profile 0000-0002-9247-8102)
Wood, Amanda (ORCID Profile 0000-0002-1537-6858)

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