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Shielding
torso protects brain from blast injuries
Saturday April 30, 2011 08:08:00 AM,
IANS
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Washington:
Tougher body armour to shield the chest, abdomen and back may be
just what soldiers in Afghanistan need to protect their brains
from mild injuries stemming from "shell shock", a study says.
Such mild trauma, resulting from the initial shock of exploding
mines, grenades and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) now
accounts for more than 80 percent of all brain injuries among US
troops.
Some 160,000 American veterans are estimated to have sustained
this kind of trauma, the Journal of Neuropathology and
Experimental Neurology reports.
"Protecting the body is absolutely essential to protecting the
brain," says senior study investigator and Johns Hopkins professor
and neuropathologist Vassilis Koliatsos.
"Blast-related injuries, including what we call blast-induced
neurotrauma ... and improvements to body armour in addition to
helmet-wearing are likely going to be needed if we want to
minimise their threat to our soldiers' health," says Koliatsos.
Koliatsos and his team used a metal shock tube specially designed
at Hopkins' Applied Physics Lab to isolate the effects of an
explosion's primary blast wave on mice, according to a Hopkins
statement.
Researchers found that a plastic glass covering the torso of
shocked mice fully protected them from damage in critical parts of
the brain, linking nerves in the brain and the spinal cord.
Koliatsos emphasises that these results do not undermine the need
to wear a helmet to shield their head from flying shrapnel and
other bomb debris and protect them from secondary blast waves,
strong enough to throw bodies more than 100 feet.
The study is the first to show widespread damage to axons (a long,
slender projection of a nerve cell or neuron, that conducts
electrical impulses) in the brain from mild blast explosions.
It was designed specifically to investigate the ill effects on the
body of the primary blast, of extremely fast-moving, high-pressure
air, researchers say.
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