Dr. Howard Smith Oncall

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cy_XXFZRaaL/ A woman’s risk of developing depressive illness following a traumatic brain injury, a TBI, is 50% greater than a man’s.  Harvard’s Mass. General Hospital anesthesiologists report this finding at their specialty’s annual scientific meeting.  They performed a meta-analysis of 9 studies covering 691,364 persons who suffered TBI. Their calculations show that 29.3% of the women developed serious psychological depression after TBI versus on 21.9% of men.  That represents a 48% higher risk.  The most frequent causes of this brain trauma in females turn out to be falls, partner violence, sports injuries, and concussions sustained during military service.  Contrast that with men’s TBIs which are caused by by blunt trauma with objects, motor vehicle accidents, self-harm, and assaults. The bottom line: women sustaining head injuries should be carefully watched over time for the development of depression by their medical teams as well as by their families. https://w