THURSDAY, Nov. 27 (HealthDay News) -- Fashion hair accessories can become embedded in the skull of blunt trauma patients, causing skull fracture, and can be difficult to detect during radiography and computer tomography (CT) scanning, according to a paper published in the December issue of the Journal of Neurosurgery: Pediatrics.
Omar N. Syed, M.D., and colleagues at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, report on two cases of blunt trauma in which radiolucent hair beads became embedded in the skull, and appeared on skull radiography and CT scans as depressed comminuted fractures.
The indentation made by the bead looked similar on the scans to that caused by air, and the bead was only observed at the site of the laceration in one of the cases, the report indicates. Once the beads were surgically removed, both patients recovered without any adverse events, the authors note.
"Injury from blunt trauma by common household objects carries the potential for significant morbidity and mortality, and the medicolegal importance of recognizing these injuries is well documented," the authors write. "The absence of an obvious foreign body on physical examination in one of our cases emphasizes the importance of heightened awareness regarding these prognostically favorable lesions. Fashion hair accessories should be considered in the differential diagnosis when children present with head injury following blunt trauma."
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