Please help! Headaches and Jaw pain in child
 

Hi,

My daughter is 11 years old and fell playing hockey over 6 weeks ago and hit her head. When it happened, she came off the ice crying. But she went back on and said she was feeling better about 15 min later. She continued to go to hockey camp every day for the next 4 days mentioning a couple of times she had a slight headache, but nothing major. She also played soccer one evening. However, about 4 days later she started having severe headache and jaw pain.

We took her to the dr who said the initial fall must have caused a concussion. She was instructed to rest, no devices/tv/reading for at least a week. She was suffering from some dizziness, and a bit of a stomach ache, but her main complaints were headache and jaw pain. She stayed home for a week mostly just laying around and playing dolls on the couch or in bed. After a week she was still having severe headaches and jaw pain so we went back to the ER expecting an xray of the jaw or something but was told it is the concussion and to stay off electronics/tv/reading for another week and rest.

After another week she was still having symptoms but they were starting to improve. Long story short, we stayed off of devices/tv/electronics for around a month, and she has not gone back to sports. Re-introducing electronics did not increase her symptoms, but she is still having them every day, just more mild that initially. No more dizziness or stomach aches. I even tried removing the electronics again and it didn't help.

We now have her in concussion physiotherapy and she is normal except her balance and tracking tests. But we don't have a baseline, so hard to say. She is doing daily exercises to improve those.

We are now over 6 weeks out, she has jaw and headache pain every day, some days severe enough she wants to take an advil and lay down to rest, others she just mentions it but can go about her day. She is not yet back to sports.

Is this normal? Is there any chance these symptoms are from something else? I take her back to the dr next week.

Please help! What should we be doing?

You might read about upper cervical chiropractic..
Nucca or upcspine are good info sites on that.

Basically she may have hit her head in a way that misaligned her c1 & c2.

My chiro used simple upper c spine adjustments and I feel it helped for my issues.
Some specialized places have x rays & special equipment to get precise adjustments..
It is very different/gentler from regular chiropractic , if that is a concern..
There are many videos on you tube so you can see how it is done..

You daughter may also have trigger points and muscle spasms , don't overlook the soft tissue , some good PT sessions might be helpful or at least a PT evaluation to check things out..
Lots of web info on trigger points and the referred pain & other symptoms they can cause..

There are chiropractors who go to school an extra two years just to be able to adjust your atlas. If the atlas is off, adjusting the rest is a waste, IMO. That would be a good thing to look into. Also, she may have some TMJ issues which will cause headaches. Have her dentist take a panarex film and it should show if her bite is off or gross problems with her TMJ. Maybe a CT of the skull and C-spine?

Agree with neck...
 

I agree with the advice to have the neck looked at. Also- does the headache go completely away when she lays flat? If so- I wonder if she could be evaluated for a CSF leak. Jaw pain can be a symptom off a CSF leak as well. Try googling it and see if her symptoms match.

These are symptoms seen with concussion. As others have stated, don't overlook the neck. Issues in the neck (and shoulders) can cause the brain to not get the nutrients it needs, causing the headaches. The vestibular (balance) is good too. You also want to have a functional ophthalmologist evaluate her vision.