Unfortunately, surgery wouldn't have helped. Things have advanced a great deal when it comes to how we treat head injury cases. The biggest killer, other than direct pressure from a localised bleed, is the generalised brain swelling. With this, a person can seem to be OK but over the hours after the accident, the brain swells. At first it isn't too much of a problem, but soon the pressure from the skull becomes too great. You can't remove the whole skull. So what they do, and it works in most cases, is put the patient into a drug-induced coma ASAP, as soon as it becomes obvious that the brain is going to swell up. The drugs prevent much of the brain swelling and saves many lives. But if the problem is too severe, it can't save everybody. As the brain swells, the pressure squeezes blood form the brain and it starves of oxygen and nutrients. A healthy brain can shut down and die so fast and nothing can be don.
If it's pressure form a bleed, it can be drained. But when the pressure is form the brain itself - once it swells too far, that's it. Brain scans show when the brain waves flat-line. Time to switch off the machines. A flat-line means it's gone. Only brainstem left working, if that.
So sad.
Marg
