Normal CT in infants and children

There have been several reports as to normal CT in children. However, they included children with convulsions as normal subjects. In our experience, children with convulsions have an enlargement of the subdural space in the frontal region. Therefore, we studied CT in children without convulsions. Of the 10,000 patients examined with EMI 1000 or EMI 1010 at Kyoto Univ. Hospital from 1976 to 1979, 110 children could be classified into the following types according to their symptoms: 1) Type-1 head injury, without abnormalities in CT resulting from this injury, 2) non-migraining headaches, and 3) others with on CT abnormalities who were routinely examined. Previous studies have shown that the enlargement of the subdural space in the frontal region was not abnormal under one year. However, the present study has shown that it was not dilated in children without convulsions. We stressed the usefulness of our newly calculated basal cistern index, because the SD was small and could be readily indentified (this index was under 0.29 in most cases; their SD's were 0.04 in those under one year and 0.02 over one year). The other data were not so different from those of previous studies. (J.P.N.)