One would assume that if a TBI victim cannot remember the injury producing event, he cannot suffer flashbacks or nightmares re-experiencing the event. Right? Wrong.
Indeed, a diagnosis of a TBI generally requires a loss of consciousness. But the victim’s loss of consciousnesss does not shield him from post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Apparently PTSD can occur after a TBI, but the TBI may alter the symptoms’ development. A TBI victim’s symptoms may relate to events that just preceded his loss of consciousness, or to events that occurred immediately after. The symptoms may even relate to details about the trauma-producing event itself that the victim learned about later in his recovery.