Takao Taketomo

Recovery Functions of Somatosensory Evoked Potentials in Posttraumatic Headache Cases

Headache is one of the most frequent complaints following head and neck injurieszo). According to Kondo et al.ls), posttraumatic headache following head injury is classified into the following 4 types: headache due to abnormal cerebrospinal fluid pressure, headache due to vasomotor abnormality, headache of cervical origin and headache of mental origin. For these years, we have investigated posttraumatic headache focusing our attention on the third category, headache of cervical origin. This type of headache is considered to be caused by injurious effects of neck hyperflexion and hyperextention at the time of head impact. Quite similar phenomena are known to occur in the so-called whiplash injuries, or the acceleration-deceleration neck injuries. In view of the fact that transient clouding of consciousness occasionally is observed in this type of injuries, brain stem impairment may well occur in some cases of this type of injuries, just like, though not so severe as, in head injury cases. Thus it may be reasonable to consider the chronic headache of cervical origin following head injury and that following neck injury combinedly as an entity: posttraumatic headache following