Robina Weermeijer, Unsplash
Robina Weermeijer, Unsplash

Men more likely to have traumatic brain injury

Embargoed until: Publicly released:

Men and women have a similar risk of experiencing a stroke, but men have 2-3 times the risk of traumatic brain injury, according to two large New Zealand studies. The BIONIC and ARCOS-IV studies, which have studied 170,000 and 1.1 million New Zealanders respectively, found traumatic brain injury was more than five times more common than stroke, with Māori and Pasifika having a higher risk of both types of condition through most of their lives.

Journal/conference: New Zealand Medical Journal

Organisation/s: University of Auckland, AUT University

Funder: Authors report grants from the Health Research Council and ABI Management Fellowship during the conduct of the study.

Media Release

From: New Zealand Medical Association (NZMA)

Key points

·         While men and women have similar stroke risk, men are at twice the relative risk of mild TBI and three times the relative risk of moderate/severe TBI

·         More TBI cases (35.6%) were identified through non-medical sources compared to stroke (3%).

·         Incidence of TBI was >5 times that of stroke.

·         New Zealand European/Pakeha had the highest TBI incidence when <5 years of age, while Māori had the highest incidence after 5 years.

·         For stroke, Pacific people and Māori had higher incidences until 75-84 years, after which Europeans had higher incidence.

Summary

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) and stroke result in significant disability within our communities and require significant medical input. Understanding the differences in who is at greatest risk and how these risks differ can assist in how prevention programmes are targeted and help ensure funding decisions are evidence based.

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New Zealand

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