[Treatment of head injury coma with prolonged pentobarbital anaesthesia (author's transl)]

Forty-five patients in deep coma resulting from head injury were treated with pentobarbital in doses adjusted to maintain serum barbiturate levels between 15 and 25 mg/l and short burst suppression phases on EEG. Brain death occurred in 20%. The overall mortality rate was 60%, no death being attributable to treatment; 24% of the patients were able to resume active life. Patients with non-reactive pupils during the early phase of coma were compared with patients of similar ages and neurological symptoms non treated with pentobarbital. In treated patients the incidence of brain death was reduced by 50% and the mortality rate by 25% (p less than 0.05), without increase in deaths from intercurrent complications and in severe sequelae among survivors.