Hi,

I am so sorry for your son's injuries. My 16 year old has had several concussions, we have now logged 8 major ones, but the first few didn't seem too bad at the time. I have learned that each injury can require more time to heal and make her more vulnerable.

As far as the MRI goes, after the car accident in Feb. 2011 where she had a whiplash and couldn't seem to shake the PCS, the neurologist said not to have an MRI for a few months as it is likely to cause her symptoms to worsen due to the very loud banging and sound vibrations.

After about 5 months of very slow recovery, she was kicked in the head and received another concussion. This time the doctors ordered an MRI after 8 weeks. She did have quite a setback with symptoms. Also, she had another MRI 8 months later (recent tremors starting,) and is now still flat out 6 weeks later with symptoms as if she is almost back to square one.

My point is that an MRI can be very useful, but they say it isn't usually necessary unless certain symptoms are present. Since it can make sensitive individuals have worsened symptoms, I say you may want to wait and let him heal unless the doctors really think he needs the scan.

It doesn't bother everyone though. But my daughter is very low threshold and the MRI does really affect her, and they can't find anything abnormal since they only really see very obvious damage. Usually concussions do not cause that kind of damage that shows up on scans.

Hang in there. I wish you son a fast recovery.