Abstract:
Background: Traumatic brain injury is a physical head injury that leads to loss of consciousness
and/or post-traumatic amnesia. Whereas, a maxillofacial trauma refers to injuries of the
oro-facial soft tissues, facial skeleton, and teeth. Understanding potential co-presence of
traumatic head injury among maxillofacial trauma patient improves overall patient outcomes.
However, despite high prevalence co-presence of this clinical scenario in Ethiopia, there is no
single published data available in Ethiopia and this study is under taken to establish base line
data on this particular clinical scenario.
Objective: This study was aimed to assess the prevalence of traumatic head injury (THI) and
associated factors among patients with maxillofacial trauma at Jimma University Medical Center
from March 2020 to February 2022.
Methods: Institution based cross-sectional study was conducted from July 7, 2022 to July 21,
2022. Data was collected from 325 (out of a total of 360) medical records of maxillofacial
trauma patient cards by using extraction checklist. The data was analyzed by using SPSS version
23 for windows. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed identify factors
associated with traumatic head injury. Adjusted odds ratio (AOR) with 95% confidence intervals
(CI) and p-value of 0.05 were used for significant association.
Results: The results showed that the prevalence of traumatic head injury among maxillofacial
trauma patient was 41.52% (135/325). The socio-demographic factors such as being male
(OR=3.991, P<0.00), age less than 24 years (OR=4.058, P<0.00), and 25-29 years (OR=3.506,
P<0.00) were found positively associated with traumatic head injury. Similarly, the odds of
traumatic head injury was nearly six-fold higher in patients who sustained motor bike
(OR=6.424, P<0.00), and motor car accidents (OR=5.666, P<0.00).
Conclusion: The results suggested that the prevalence of traumatic head injury among
maxillofacial patients was considerably high. Moreover, the results identified that gender (being
male) and younger age sustaining road traffic accidents associated with traumatic head injury
that varies across facial anatomical location of the injuries.
