Assessment of memory functioning over two years following severe childhood traumatic brain injury: results of the TGE cohort

ABSTRACT

The aims of this study were (1) to prospectively measure memory functioning following severe childhood Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), and its evolution over 2 years; (2) to assess demographic and medical factors associated with memory function and recovery; (3) to explore relations between memory and other TBI outcomes.

Methods: Children (aged 0–15 years; n= 65) consecutively admitted in a single trauma center over a 3-year period, who survived severe non-inflicted TBI, were included in a prospective longitudinal study. Memory was assessed in 38 children aged 5–15 years at injury, using the Children’s Memory Scale at 3, 12, and 24 months post-injury.

Results: Mean general memory score was low at 3 months (M = 90.2, SD = 20.3) but within the normal range at 12 and 24 months (M = 100.6, SD = 23.1 and M = 108.6, SD = 24.1, respectively), with high variability. Improvement was stronger for immediate visual memory than for other memory indices. Lower general memory score was associated with higher injury severity, lower intellectual ability and functional status, higher overall disability, and ongoing education.

Conclusion: Memory functioning is highly variable following severe childhood TBI, related to injury severity and functional, cognitive and educational outcomes; improvement is significant during the first-year post-injury, but varies according to the type of memory.

KEYWORDS:

• Severe traumatic brain injury
• memory
• outcome
• longitudinal cohort study
• child
• adolescent
• educational outcome

Acknowledgments

We wish to thank Mrs.Mélanie Araujo for her work on the data in an earlier phase of the analyses and we also thank the patients and their families for their participation in this study. We would also like to thank Caroline Barry and Christine Hassler for their valuable remarks. Results of this study were presented at the 12^th ISPRM conference in Paris in July2018 and at the 3^rd IPBIS conference in Belfast in September2018.

Declaration of interest

The authors declare that they have no competing interest.

Additional information

Funding

The initial data collection for the initiation of the cohort study was funded by the Département de la Recherche Clinique et du Développement, AP-HP (Paris, No. PHRC 2003; AOM 03018). In depth data analyses and manuscript preparation were funded thanks to a co-funding of the French Ministry of Health (Direction Générale de la Santé); studies, assessment and statistics by the national fund for health insurance of salaried workers, the national fund for health insurance of independent workers, the national fund for solidarity and autonomy, and by the National Institute for Prevention and Education for Health, in the call for research projects launched by the IReSP in 2011, and by two grants awarded to Hugo Câmara-Costa: one from the French Speaking Society of Research in Children with Disabilities (SFERHE, www.sferhe.org) and one joint grant from the French Traumatic Brain Injury Society (France Traumatisme Crânien - FTC) and the French Speaking Society of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (SOFMER, www.sofmer.com).