Abstract

LUQUE SUAREZ, JORGE ENRIQUE. PENETRATING WOUNDS FIREARMS OF THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM: PART TWO: PHYSIOPATHOLOGY OF THE LESIONS, CLINICAL CASES AND MANAGEMENT. rev.fac.med [online]. 2007, vol.15, n.2, pp.306-312. ISSN 0121-5256.

As a consequence of the continued armed conflict in Colombia, which might as well be called a low intensity war, the Armed Forces personnel, suffer with relative frequency penetrating wounds from firearms, who in the majority are transferred to the Hospital Militar Central in Bogota, with an average of 350 patients in the multiple services. The majority of the cases are due to wounds from high speed firearms, which cause significant tissue damage from the liberated energy, as well as from fragmentation weapons, in which there are a multiplicity of lesions seen. This review is limited to those cases localized within the central nervous system. In continuity with the first part, this second part goes into details of the phisiopathology of these types of wounds in the central nervous system and we show some extraordinary cases, emphasizing to the reader the basic knowledge necessary for the management of these patients.

Keywords : central nervous system diseases; penetrating wounds; firearms.