Word: whiplash
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Died. Zachary Scott, 51, character actor, a mustachioed Texan who ambled around Hollywood wearing a pirate-style gold earring, was most often cast as the oil-slick villain of Hollywood cliffhangers (Ruthless, Whiplash), but proved equally proficient in the demanding Broadway role of the relentless defense attorney in Faulkner's 1959 Requiem for a Nun; of cancer; in Austin, Texas...
Invisible Damage. Many neurologists are now convinced that whiplash, without a direct blow on the head and leaving no scratch on the skull, may nevertheless cause bruises and hemorrhages in the brain...
...head injuries could have been saved. Lasting or delayed disability could be similarly reduced, reported Pakistani-born Dr. Ayub K. Ommaya, of the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Blindness at Bethesda, Md. Detection, however, is doubly difficult in the peculiar and treacherous kind of injury known as "whiplash"-the result of the sudden forward-and-backward snapping of the head that is common in rear-end auto accidents...
...experiments to determine the effects of the lash, Dr. Ommaya's group of researchers produced whiplash injuries in monkeys. A compressed-air gun, fired behind the animals' heads, created the snap movement. The monkeys had been anesthetized before the test, and then were killed painlessly before they could recover consciousness. Autopsies showed that whiplash bruised some of the animals' brains, caused swelling and hemorrhaging. In several cases, it also injured nerve centers in the brain stem that are important in controlling heartbeat, circulation and breathing...
People who have had whiplash accidents sometimes complain of blinding headaches, partial paralysis, dizziness, deafness, blindness-and inability to tolerate alcohol. But because it has been difficult or impossible in most cases to detect physical damage to the brain, lawyers for insurance companies-as well as some doctors-have argued that such symptoms are psychologically induced by the "blow from behind," and are more imaginary than real. Experiments like Dr. Ommaya's go far to confirm the possibility of severe and lasting, though invisible, damage...