Geriatric Traumatic Brain Injury in Hungary and Eastern Europe

Abstract

While the incidence of traumatic brain injury (TBI) is decreasing in the young, active population, injuries are getting more frequent among the elderly; as the geriatric population is in a constant rise and the relative cost of care is particularly high in this group of patients, the economic burden of TBI does not decline. This review is aimed to identify predisposing factors and characteristic features of geriatric brain injury, primarily focusing on the comparison between Eastern and Western European countries. While economically each of these is a high- ormiddle-income coun- try, the differences in mortality and morbidity, approaches, and policies applied by health care providers are substantial. On the basis of the disappointing outcome results in Eastern Europe, one may conclude that therapeutic guidelines defined on the basis of the “Western experience” should only be applied in conjunction with a systematic reorganization of health care in Eastern Europe.