The final stages of hydrocephalus involve fluid buildup that causes extreme pressure and permanent damage to brain tissue.
In the final stages of hydrocephalus, a person experiences profound physical and cognitive decline, which includes total loss of mobility, severe unresponsiveness, complete urinary and bowel incontinence and even a high risk of life threatening complications such as brain herniation or infections.
The severe physical decline in the final stages of hydrocephalus include:
Constant lethargy, like deep unresponsiveness, stupor, or coma where the person can't be woken easily.
Swallowing failure, with an inability to safely swallow food or liquids (dysphagia), which leads to high risks of aspiration pneumonia.
Extreme muscle changes, like muscles that can become rigid or severely stiff, or even conversely limp and weak.
And complete immobility includes becoming bedbound and even losing the ability to stand or walk.
The advanced cognitive and neurological signs of the final stages of hydrocephalus include profound dementia, total incontinence and reflex and cranial changes like abnormal reflexes, seizures or fixed eye movements like the eyes looking downward.
Total incontinence, includes complete loss of bowel control and bladder control and profound dementia includes complete loss of memory, recognition of loved ones and basic communication skills.
You can recover from hydrocephalus and even live a normal life with hydrocephalus as long as you get prompt treatment for the hydrocephalus.
Although, there's is not really any complete cure for hydrocephalus, getting prompt treatment such as through use of a surgical drainage tube that is called a shunt or even through another treatment procedure called Endoscopic Third ventriculostomy or (ETV), can relieve pressure on the brain successfully and reverse many symptoms.
The brain shunt drains extra fluid safely away from the brain to another part of the body and physical signs like trouble walking often will improve first and then memory and thinking skills can take several weeks or even months to get better.
Physical or occupational therapy also helps the person rebuild their strength and balance.
Finding and treating the hydrocephalus early enough leads to much better outcomes and shunts also require regular checkups with a doctor to make sure the shunt is working right.
And blockages or infections are possible complications that can occur, which means that you may require more medical care.
The life expectancy of someone with hydrocephalus is often normal or even near normal life expectancy as long as it's treated with prompt surgical treatment.
Left untreated hydrocephalus is dangerous and carries a pretty high rate of mortality, although getting prompt care through shunts or endoscopic medical procedures improves survival rates of people with hydrocephalus vastly to around 83% to 95%.
Infants who survive past age 1 with treatment for hydrocephalus often experience and live a normal lifespan.
In untreated cases, around 50% of infants that are left untreated for hydrocephalus don't survive past age 3, and up to 80% don't reach adulthood.
Most children with hydrocephalus that are treated, live full lives, although they may also require multiple shunt revisions as they grow into adulthood.
And for older adults who are diagnosed with Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus, which is often diagnosed past age 60, live around 7.7 years after successful shunt surgery, although some older adults may even live longer lives.
Hydrocephalus is not always a terminal illness although if hydrocephalus is left untreated it can be fatal and kill you.
The excess fluid buildup in hydrocephalus creates severe pressure inside the skull and this dangerous pressure can eventually compress your brainstem, which is what controls vital life functions like heart rate and breathing.
The high pressure destroys delicate brain cells and brainstem compression leads to a loss of basic body functions and historical data also shows that up to 1/2 of untreated cases of hydrocephalus can be fatal.
The warning signs of emergency pressure in hydrocephalus include sudden loss of balance or coordination, extreme sleepiness or trouble waking up, sudden vision changes or blurry sight, frequent vomiting or constant nausea and severe and constant headaches.
If yourself or someone else you know experiences any sudden severe headaches, vomiting or even confusion, you should seek emergency medical treatment right away or call 911 or get to the ER.
The root cause of hydrocephalus is a physical blockage (obstruction), which stops the normal flow of cerebrospinal fluid also known as CSF fluid through the pathways of the brain.
And in congenital cases of hydrocephalus, this is most frequently aqueductal stenosis, which is a narrowing of the passage between the third and fourth ventricles.
And in acquired cases of hydrocephalus, blockages or even absorption issues stem from brain bleeds, tumors or infections.
Common causes of hydrocephalus by type include:
Congenital (Present at Birth) cases of hydrocephalus:
Aqueductal stenosis: Narrowing of the cerebral aqueduct.
Spina bifida: Neural tube defects linked to spinal and brain malformations.
Intraventricular hemorrhage: Bleeding in the brain due to premature birth.
Prenatal infections: Conditions like rubella or syphilis causing brain inflammation.
Acquired (Developed Later in Life) cases of hydrocephalus include:
Stroke or head injury: Causes bleeding inside or around the brain.
Brain or spinal cord tumors: Physical masses that block fluid drainage.
Meningitis or other CNS infections: Causes inflammation that impairs fluid absorption.
Hydrocephalus can have links that are both genetic and inherited, although most cases of hydrocephalus are not passed down directly from the parents.
Hydrocephalus is often caused by a mix of genetic changes as well as environmental factors during fetal development, or even by acquired infections, brain injuries or even bleeding later in life.
Around or up to a quarter of congenital hydrocephalus (present at birth) cases involve factors that are genetic or gene mutations which affect how the brain develops.
And rare instances, hydrocephalus can be directly inherited, like X-linked hydrocephalus, which is a specific genetic mutation on the X chromosome that is passed from mothers to male children and most genetic forms of hydrocephalus don't follow a simple inherited pattern, instead multiple genes may even act as risk factors alongside of non genetic influences.
Acquired and non genetic causes of hydrocephalus include infections, premature birth and later life events like head injuries, strokes, tumors or brain bleeding can cause acquired hydrocephalus at any age.
Certain infections during pregnancy like rubella, cause inflammation and bleeding inside the brain's ventricles can block fluid flow.
The first symptom of hydrocephalus in infants is a rapidly growing or unusually large head, bulging soft spot and even extreme sleepiness and poor feeding.
In older children and adults, the early signs and symptoms of hydrocephalus are nausea, morning headaches, blurred vision and balance issues.
An infant with hydrocephalus will experience rapid head growth or a head size that is too large and have a tense or bulging soft spot (fontanelle) on top of their head.
The infants eyes will also often be fixed downward, which is called "sunsetting" eyes and experience high pitched crying as well as sluggishness, extreme sleepiness or irritability and have trouble sucking or feeding.
Children and teens with hydrocephalus will also often have frequent headaches, especially in the morning, nausea and vomiting, blurred or double vision, loss of balance or poor coordination and sudden drop in school performance.
And the signs of hydrocephalus in adults and older adults include ongoing morning headaches, trouble walking or having a shuffling gait, which is common in normal pressure hydrocephalus, loss of bladder control or frequent urination and even memory loss, confusion or slowed thinking.
The 3 W's of hydrocephalus are wet, wobbly, and wacky and are also known as Hakim's triad.
The wet, wobbly, and wacky which are the 3 W's of hydrocephalus describe the classic symptom group of bladder incontinence, walking trouble and memory or thinking changes that can occur in people with hydrocephalus.
The wet in hydrocephalus describes urinary incontinence or a strong sudden need to use the restroom.
The wobbly, in hydrocephalus describes the trouble walking, balance issues or even a slow, wide based "magnetic" step.
And the wacky, in hydrocephalus describes memory loss, confusion, or even slow thinking, which can look like dementia.
Certain types of hydrocephalus can also make you pee a lot and can cause urinary frequency, urgency and even loss of bladder control.
The urinary symptoms of hydrocephalus is a core sign of NPH or normal pressure hydrocephalus, which is a form of fluid buildup in your brain, which mostly affects older adults and can also appear in children.
The signs of NPH and hydrocephalus are bladder changes like needing to pee a lot, sudden strong urges to pee or even bladder leaks.
Walking trouble, like shuffling steps, poor balance or even a hard time walking and even mild memory loss, confusion, or trouble focusing.
Some people with hydrocephalus do also sleep a lot, although the sleep patterns in people with hydrocephalus also vary widely depending on the person's age as well as the type of hydrocephalus.
People with hydrocephalus can and sometimes do experience excessive daytime sleepiness or unusual lethargy, and other people with hydrocephalus experience insomnia or trouble sleeping.
Adults that have normal pressure hydrocephalus often report high levels of daytime sleepiness, which can also sometimes improve after shunt surgery.
And babies with hydrocephalus may also sleep a lot during their first year of life as their brains rest and heal.
And sudden or extreme sleepiness, lethargy, or difficulty waking up can also be a sign of increased intracranial pressure or a malfunctioning shunt, which also requires immediate medical attention.
Many people with hydrocephalus also experience, struggling with insomnia, frequent night waking or even restless sleep due to chronic headaches, pain or anxiety.
Hydrocephalus does sometimes make you tired as excess fluid and pressure inside your brain with hydrocephalus often causes severe fatigue, sluggishness or even extreme sleepiness, which can also be a warning sign that a medical shunt is either failing or is blocked.
Common signs of fatigue and pressure with hydrocephalus include feeling unusually exhausted or weak during the day, having trouble waking up from sleep or staying awake, having low energy levels and a general slowing of movement and even brain fog or trouble focusing.
Feeling some tiredness with hydrocephalus is normal although experiencing any extreme sleepiness or difficulty walking up with hydrocephalus can mean that dangerous pressure is building up in the brain, so you should get emergency medical attention right away if the tiredness also comes along with bad headaches, throwing up or feeling sick to your stomach, vision changes like blurry vision or double vision or any fever or redness around the shunt site.
The gait of hydrocephalus is an apraxic gait or magnetic gait where the feet of the person with hydrocephalus appear glued or even stuck to the floor.
The gait with hydrocephalus is often slow, unsteady and wide based with short, shuffling steps.