My MC is 18 and was hit over the head with a broken bottle late at night. She was groggy, but not quite unconscious. Her friends took her to the hospital where a scan showed no serious brain injury. They stitched her up. She has a bad headache. Sound realistic?
Firstly, they are unliklely to do a scan unless they suspect damage to the brain itself. Scans are time consuming, costly and require a neurologist to examine them - if it's late at night chances are there may not be anyone on who can do it.
More likely is that they will clean and stitch any wounds, check her responses and send her for an xray as these can be assessed by any radiographer and there will be some of those on for sure.
To note - there are other signs of serious problems, such as bleeding from the ear, which may indicate a skull fracture.
After that, it's home - so long as someone is there to take you.
In my experience the worst thing is the nausea - I threw up repeatedly (in Ireland we call that extreme nausea 'boking your ring up' but that's OT) and the confusion. The only way I can describe it is like being half asleep when nothing seems real - this is the stage where people tend to talk complete rubbish.
For the first few days I wasn't in pain, or at least I don't think I was. But I remember the pain later - it can take anything from a couple of days to weeks to recover from a concussion.
I was completely useless for a couple of weeks though - I was confused all the time, and kept forgetting stuff. I wasn't allowed to drive either.
Will they keep her in overnight? Or will they send her home with her parents, since a scan showed nothing major?
It depends on how she seems and the severity of the injury.
Thanks so much everyone. I'll look up those links. Oddly, they're supposedly common, but neither I or my kids have ever had a concussion.
Thanks!
I've had a couple - mostly the result of horse riding accidents, and once when I bent down to pick up a bucket and somehow managed to smash my head against the wall. Not good.