Forensic aspect of cerebral contusions

Abstract

Introduction. Contusions are injuries of the brain dominantly incurred by blunt-force trauma in the head (blow, impact, fall). Proper analysis of the cerebral contusions within all head injuries and data case gives us complete view of the event and enables us to choose the right direction in the investigation. The aim of this investigation was to perform a forensic medical analysis of cases with brain injury (cerebral contusions) incurred by blunt-force trauma, and to compare results with a prior extensive research done at the Institute of Forensic Medicine, Skopje. Methods. A total of 76 cases with cerebral contusions incurred by blunt-force trauma were included. The following data were analyzed: gender, age, event, skull fractures, type of fracture, localisation of contusions and toxicological analysis. The basic descriptive processing included the above information-variables taken from the written reports of the performed autopsies. The data are displayed graphically with the use of Microsoft Excel 2007. Results. Male was the dominant gender in the analyzed cases (86%), with mean age of 51 years. Traffic accidents were the main factor for these injuries (76%). Skull fractures were found in 67% of cases. The dominant cerebral lobes were the temporal and the frontal lobe, and the contrecoup contusions were found in 55% of cases. Conclusions. The experience gained during the processing and analysis of these brain injuries answers the most complicated questions, and contributes to the healthcare especially in dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of cerebral contusions.