Do Estado Vegetativo à Participação: A Amantadina Como Potenciadora do Programa de Reabilitação.

Autores da FMUP

• Rui Manuel Lopes Nunes

  Autor

Participantes de fora da FMUP

• Zão A
• Almeida AF
• Beça G

Unidades de investigação

• Medicina da Comunidade, Informação e Decisão em Saúde

• RISE-Health

  

  Investigador

  Fernando Carlos De Landér Schmitt

Abstract

The use of amantadine in clinical practice still seems limited, despite its increasing evidence in the emergence of vegetative state after traumatic brain injury. We describe the case of an adolescent with severe traumatic brain injury after being run over by a car. After four months of hospitalization in a Central Hospital where he remained in a vegetative state, he was transferred to a Rehabilitation Center. He underwent a comprehensive rehabilitation program with physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy, including multisensory stimulation and intervention in the surrounding environment. He started amantadine, 50 mg/day, titrated up to 200 mg/day, with significant clinical and functional improvements, and emerged from vegetative state to minimally conscious state at week three and recovered consciousness at the sixth week of amantadine, maintaining progressive improvement, even after drug suspension. The case described underlines the importance of a holistic intervention and corroborates the literature in demonstrating the efficacy and safety of amantadine in the emergence from vegetative state.

Keywords

• Amantadine; Brain Injuries, Traumatic / drug therapy; Brain Injuries, Traumatic / rehabilitation; Persistent Vegetative State