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Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review

Abusive head trauma (AHT) represents a very serious global public health problem. Prevention of these episodes is essential to reduce the morbidity and mortality of this phenomenon. All healthcare professionals should be able to recognize the signs of abuse. However, diagnosis is very complex as the...

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Autores principales: Sacco, Matteo Antonio, Gualtieri, Saverio, Tarda, Lucia, Ricci, Pietrantonio, Aquila, Isabella
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10572508/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37835835
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics13193093
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author Sacco, Matteo Antonio
Gualtieri, Saverio
Tarda, Lucia
Ricci, Pietrantonio
Aquila, Isabella
author_facet Sacco, Matteo Antonio
Gualtieri, Saverio
Tarda, Lucia
Ricci, Pietrantonio
Aquila, Isabella
author_sort Sacco, Matteo Antonio
collection PubMed
description Abusive head trauma (AHT) represents a very serious global public health problem. Prevention of these episodes is essential to reduce the morbidity and mortality of this phenomenon. All healthcare professionals should be able to recognize the signs of abuse. However, diagnosis is very complex as the signs are often blurred and cannot be recognized with certainty without carrying out adequate instrumental investigations. It has been calculated that approximately one-third of AHT cases remain undetected and require more than one medical visit to be correctly interpreted and diagnosed. On the other hand, the literature has recently also emphasized the problems related to possible false diagnoses of abuse and the numerous family and personal repercussions that follow from this issue. For these reasons, correct and timely recognition is essential to avoid the risk of recurrence of AHT and to start proper forensic investigations, in order to identify the offender or exonerate a suspect. The present work explores the most recent evidence of recent years in the field of AHT diagnostics through a literature review. The purpose of this article is to provide forensic pathologists with clear tools for diagnosis based on the literature. To this end, the review suggests clinical and forensic protocols aimed at the timely diagnosis of AHT in order to prevent abuse from remaining undetected.
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spelling pubmed-105725082023-10-14 Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review Sacco, Matteo Antonio Gualtieri, Saverio Tarda, Lucia Ricci, Pietrantonio Aquila, Isabella Diagnostics (Basel) Review Abusive head trauma (AHT) represents a very serious global public health problem. Prevention of these episodes is essential to reduce the morbidity and mortality of this phenomenon. All healthcare professionals should be able to recognize the signs of abuse. However, diagnosis is very complex as the signs are often blurred and cannot be recognized with certainty without carrying out adequate instrumental investigations. It has been calculated that approximately one-third of AHT cases remain undetected and require more than one medical visit to be correctly interpreted and diagnosed. On the other hand, the literature has recently also emphasized the problems related to possible false diagnoses of abuse and the numerous family and personal repercussions that follow from this issue. For these reasons, correct and timely recognition is essential to avoid the risk of recurrence of AHT and to start proper forensic investigations, in order to identify the offender or exonerate a suspect. The present work explores the most recent evidence of recent years in the field of AHT diagnostics through a literature review. The purpose of this article is to provide forensic pathologists with clear tools for diagnosis based on the literature. To this end, the review suggests clinical and forensic protocols aimed at the timely diagnosis of AHT in order to prevent abuse from remaining undetected. MDPI 2023-09-29 /pmc/articles/PMC10572508/ /pubmed/37835835 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics13193093 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Sacco, Matteo Antonio
Gualtieri, Saverio
Tarda, Lucia
Ricci, Pietrantonio
Aquila, Isabella
Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title_full Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title_fullStr Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title_full_unstemmed Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title_short Clinical and Forensic Investigation Protocols for Diagnosing Abusive Head Trauma: A Literature Review
title_sort clinical and forensic investigation protocols for diagnosing abusive head trauma: a literature review
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10572508/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37835835
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics13193093
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