Identification of Hypoxic Regions in Traumatic Brain Injury

Because perfusion brain SPECT provides images with low resolution and MRI identifies only structural changes, these two tests routinely applied in a clinical setting may not identify all injuries in the brain after closed head trauma. In this case, I-123 iodoazomycin arabinoside showed that a patient had a hypoxic brain injury even though the findings of both perfusion SPECT and MRI were normal. Although the patient was clinically and neurologically normal, neuropsychological testing revealed abnormal cognitive function.All the investigations were conducted in the subacute phase of traumatic brain injury (approximately 6 months after initial trauma). The patient was selected for intensive rehabilitation therapy. The scores of cognitive function returned to normal when assessments were repeated 12 months after trauma. In conclusion, a normal result of perfusion brain SPECT does not exclude hypoxic brain injury.