Neurointensive care of traumatic brain injury in the elderly—age-specific secondary insult levels and optimal physiological levels to target need to be defined

BACKGROUND: Elderly patients with traumatic brain injury increase. Current targets and secondary insult definitions during neurointensive care (NIC) are mostly based on younger patients. The aim was therefore to study the occurrence of predefined secondary insults and the impact on outcome in different ages with particular focus on elderly. METHODS: Patients admitted to Uppsala 2008–2014 were included. Patient characteristics, NIC management, monitoring data, and outcome were analyzed. The percentage of monitoring time for ICP, CPP, MAP, and SBP above-/below-predefined thresholds was calculated. RESULTS: Five hundred seventy patients were included, 151 elderly ≥ 65 years and 419 younger 16–64 years. Age ≥ 65 had significantly higher percentage of CPP > 100, MAP > 120, and SBP > 180 and age 16–64 had higher percentage of ICP ≥ 20, CPP ≤ 60, and MAP ≤ 80. Age ≥ 65 contributed independently to the different secondary insult patterens. When patients in all ages were analyzed, low percentage of CPP > 100 and SBP > 180, respectively, was significant predictors of favorable outcome and high percentage of ICP ≥ 20, CPP > 100, SBP ≤ 100, and SBP > 180, respectively, was predictors of death. Analysis of age interaction showed that patients ≥ 65 differed and had a higher odds for favorable outcome with large proportion of good monitoring time with SBP > 180. CONCLUSIONS: Elderly ≥ 65 have different patterns of secondary insults/physiological variables, which is independently associated to age. The finding that SBP > 180 increased the odds of favorable outcome in the elderly but decreased the odds in younger patients may indicate that blood pressure should be treated differently depending on age. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00701-021-05047-z.