EARLY EXPERIENCE OF THE UTILITY OF THE EUROPEAN HEAD-INJURY EVALUATION CHART

The European Head Injury Evaluation Chart (EHIEC) was designed by the European Brain Injury Society to assess head-injured patients from the initial insult to several years following injury. We describe the exp erience of using the EHIEC in assessing 56 consecutive traumatically b rain-injured people admitted to an early inpatient brain injury rehabi litation programme over a 9-month period. An account of its use on adm ission and at discharge in a subgroup of 40 cases is also given. The d ifficulties in relation to the length of time to administer the EHIEC, the wording, definition and scoring of items are discussed. We sugges t that an instruction manual is required and conclude that, while in i ts present form it represents a potentially useful checklist, further work is needed to refine the instrument and establish its validity and reliability.