ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a case study of a girl named Rosie, who was involved in a road traffic accident. She suffered a closed head injury secondary to rapid deceleration injuries, as well as a left occipital skull fracture, and had numerous episodes of seizures in the days following the accident. It also presents a case study of a boy named Bruce. At age 17, he received a closed head injury while playing American football. The long-held notion that head-injured children are spared serious complications in cognitive and language functioning due to the plasticity of the developing brain has been abandoned in the light of mounting empirical evidence to the contrary. While 'serviceable speech' often resumes after closed head injury, recent studies of language functioning after paediatric head injury demonstrate the presence of 'subclinical' deficits. It is important that children with previous head injuries receive comprehensive language and neuropsychological evaluation to document deficits that may affect their academic and social development.
