Abstract
At present, the main goal of brain trauma management is to minimize the secondary injury of the brain that starts immediately after the primary insult and is often crucial for survival and patient's quality of life. It is, therefore, no surprise that imaging methods are a subject to increasing demand on their functionality.
It is essential to specify the extent, localisation (including prognosticaly important brain stem lesions) and type (important for prediction of endangered area) of a lesion as precisely and as soon as possible. A non-contrast CT scan (that still is the golden standard in the majority of institutions) does not seem to suffice anymore.
Our case study presents an example where magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was employed in a paediatric patient with traumatic brain injury and emphasizes the importance of MRI in the investigational protocol. In the discussion, we debate current practice and requirements for the use of MRI in diagnosis, prognosis and selection of optimal therapeutic strategy in patients with brain injury.