Consciousness recovery after various periods in vegetative state.

Background: Recent studies suggest that late recovery from vegetative state (VS) is more prevalent today than previously thought. This study examined the decline in the rate of recovery from VS with time after admission to rehabilitation, and established a new time frame, in which the odds of recovery from VS remain substantial.

Methods: Data of 206 patients with VS after traumatic and non-traumatic brain injuries (TBI and NTBI), who were treated at the Loewenstein Rehabilitation Hospital (LRH), in Raanana, Israel, between 2003 and 2015, and described in a previous publication, were further analysed.

Validation of the QOLIBRI - Quality of Life after Brain Injury questionnaire in patients after TBI in Israel.

Background: The QOLIBRI - Quality of Life after Brain Injury questionnaire was developed by the QOLIBRI Task Force (QTF). Our goal was to investigate the applicability, validity and reliability of the QOLIBRI in Israel.

Methods: Validation of the Hebrew questionnaire was performed after it had been administered to 128 adults with traumatic brain injury (TBI), who were between 3 months' and 15 years' post-discharge from rehabilitation.

Vegetative state outcomes improved over the last two decades.

Objective: To describe late outcomes in patients with prolonged unawareness, and factors affecting them.

Design: A retrospective study of 154 patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and 52 with non-traumatic brain injury (NTBI), admitted for intensive care and consciousness rehabilitation (ICCR), in a vegetative state (VS) lasting over 1 month.

Results: Survival rate (67% total) was higher than in past studies carried out at the same facility (p < 0.

Survival and mortality following TBI.

Objectives: Evaluation of life expectancy (LE) post traumatic brain injury (TBI) is important for planning services for patients and for dealing with medico-legal aspects. We hypothesized that LE for patients who survived 2 years post injury is equal to that of the general population (GP).

Methods: A cohort of 279 patients was assembled during a 5-year period and was followed for 22-27 years.

Long-term functional outcome after moderate-to-severe paediatric traumatic brain injury.

Background: Long-term follow-up studies after severe and moderate pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI) are not common and inconclusive. Most studies focused on neurobehavioural sequelae, less data is reported about age appropriate function. Different prognostic factors were noted over past decades.

[Temporal change in rehabilitation outcome of patients following severe traumatic brain injury].

The clinical experience in recent years regarding vocational outcome of patients following traumatic brain injury (TBI) led to the impression of worse outcomes in recent years. A comparative study was therefore conducted between a "control group" of patients who were treated during the years 1980-1985 (n=147), evaluated during 1993 and a "research group" hospitalized between 1998-2001 and evaluated during 2004 (n=247). No significant differences were found between the control and research groups regarding most of the demographic and injury-related parameters.

Methylphenidate effect on hemispheric attentional imbalance in patients with traumatic brain injury: a psychophysical study.

Primary Objective: We found spatially asymmetric allocation of attention in patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) without overt asymmetry on neurological examination. The possible effect of Methylphenidate in reducing this asymmetry is evaluated in the current research.

Research Design: Psychophysical study using a visual spatial attention task.

Hemispheric visual atentional imbalance in patients with traumatic brain injury.

We find a spatially asymmetric allocation of attention in patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) despite the lack of obvious asymmetry in neurological indicators. Identification performance was measured for simple spatial patterns presented briefly to a locus 5 degrees into the left or right hemifield, after precuing attention to the same (ipsilateral) or opposite (cross-hemifield) side. Though the cue was non-predictive of target location overall, performance was significantly slower for cross than for ipsilateral trials in both patients and controls.

Vegetative state.

Nowadays more and more patients survive severe brain injury, whether due to traumatic or other causes, owing to the technological advances in medicine. Added to this is a better understanding of pathophysiologic processes, the quality and availability of emergency medicine, and increased medical knowledge in the field. More patients are regaining consciousness than previously.

Differential time and related appearance of signs, indicating improvement in the state of consciousness in vegetative state traumatic brain injury (VS-TBI) patients after initiation of dopamine treatment.

Objective: The goal of the study was to look for the response of treatment with increasing doses of dopaminergic medication on the recovery of vegetative state patients post-TBI.

Design: A prospective study of eight patients aged 25-50 years in vegetative state (VS) of mean duration of 104 days following traumatic brain injury (TBI) was performed by investigating changes of their state of consciousness while they were treated with levodopa/carbidopa.

Results: Initial improvement was observed in all patients within a mean of 13 days after onset of treatment.

Script memory for typical and atypical actions: controls versus patients with severe closed-head injury.

Objective: When typical and atypical information about a situation is presented, the latter is usually better recognized. This phenomenon is referred to as the 'typicality effect'. It is claimed by most theories that typical and atypical information are mediated by automatic and effortful processes, respectively.

Impaired skill learning in patients with severe closed-head injury as demonstrated by the serial reaction time (SRT) task.

A group of 20 patients who sustained closed-head injury (CHI) and a matched control group of 20 individuals were tested on the serial reaction time (SRT) task. Three different sequence-learning measures were generated from the task: two implicit and one explicit. The two implicit sequence-learning measures include: (1) the learning rate on the first five blocks of the repeated sequence, assumed to reflect primarily general reaction time learning, and (2) the difference between the fifth block of the repeated sequence and the sixth block, a random sequence that reflects implicit sequence-specific learning.

Searching with unilateral neglect.

We address two longstanding conflicts in the visual search and unilateral neglect literature by studying feature and conjunction search performance of neglect patients using laterally presented search arrays. The first issue relates to whether feature search is performed independently of attention, or rather requires "spread attention." If feature search is "preattentive," it should survive neglect.

Quantitative imaging in late TBI. Part II: cognition and work after closed and penetrating head injury: a report of the Vietnam head injury study.

Context: Functional outcome in relation to CT findings in traumatic brain injured (TBI) patients is not well established in relation to cognitive and vocational outcome.

Objective: To investigate the possible correlation between relatively simple quantitative radiological measurements and cognitive and vocational outcome.

Design: Retrospective analysis of quantitative assessment of CT studies in relation to post-injury cognitive changes and vocational outcome.

Quantitive imaging in late traumatic brain injury. Part I: late imaging parameters in closed and penetrating head injuries.

Objective: To ascertain the value of relatively simple quantitative radiologic measurements after head injury. Despite major advances in neuroradiology, analysis and reporting of imaging studies is based primarily on individual subjective and local experience, rather than on reproducible, standardized parameters; reliance on newer technologies can improve care, but also raises diagnostic costs.

Design: Blinded, retrospective, quantitative assessment of computerized tomography studies done some 14 years post-injury.