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Inside Mild Traumatic Brain Injury
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Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI)

The mechanism of the trauma was previously thought to be a shearing/tearing of brain tissue which results from abrupt acceleration and deceleration of the head and the soft brain inside (see Brain Injury).  During a low speed whiplash injury of only 7 mph the head may be accelerated to 9-18 g. Since the brain is a soft structure, shear strains are created as the outer, hard part of the skull moves differentially from the inner, soft part of the brain. This is intensified as the momentum of the head changes rapidly in a forward/backward direction during a whiplash trauma. If your head is turned, this compounds the injury, as parts of the brain smash against the inner dividers (called falx cerebri) that separate the two halves of the brain.  In medical terms, the most important factors in whiplash induced concussion are the 

In layman's terms, the more and the faster your head moves in relation to the rest of your body, the more likely you are to be hurt.  In addition, if you strike something - like the dashboard, windshield, steering wheel, etc. you also greatly increase the likelihood of injury.

In a study that surveyed 6,000 cases of patients suffering from cervical spine injury related headaches, it was reported that the average duration of headaches after cessation of treatment was 15 years, with females more likely to suffer chronic problems than males.

The most common symptoms and brain dysfunctions after MTBI associated with whiplash are:

The delay in onset of symptoms of headache from MTBI is usually no more than 24 hours. However, there is no correlation between the severity of the cranial insult and the intensity of headaches . In contrast, typical post-concussion syndrome symptoms (irritability, concentration difficulty, fatigue, etc.) may appear weeks or months after an injury.

The relationship between memory and brain injuries is well known. Less well understood are the factors to help us predict outcome. Severity of injury is probably one of the most significant factors. There is recent evidence that loss of consciousness, once thought to have predictive value in cases of MTBI, is not an important predictor of memory, although it may have a link to intellectual impairment. 

In a recent report on a group of 29 MTBI patients reevaluated after 5-10 years, 

Not only is proper care critical in the management of MTBI patients, so too must they be careful to avoid another injury while they are still healing.  This Second Impact Syndrome can have very serious complications, sometimes even leading to death.