Earlier this month, corporate communications executive Priscillia Lee had an accident in the bathroom. The 31-year-old mother of one slipped and hit the left side of her head against a wall.

She felt nauseous and, a few days after that, had intense headaches on that side of her head. Her condition did not improve after two visits to a general practitioner, so she went to see a neurologist for a brain scan.

She explains: 'My friend sent me this New Paper article and I got worried after reading it.'

She is referring to a news report earlier this month about 26-year-old marketing executive, Ms Sai Fengmin, who died from acute brain haemorrhage. Four weeks before her death, she had knocked her head against a glass panel, but felt fine afterwards.

She had a headache only a month later and fainted at work. She died in her sleep the next morning in the hospital. It seemed like a delayed consequence of the head collision, which had initially appeared harmless.

However, doctors LifeStyle spoke to suggest that Ms Sai's bleeding of the brain was probably not due to the accident, even though one cannot say for sure.

The reason: There were no apparent symptoms following the knock to indicate there was any serious trauma.

Neurosurgeon Dr Yeo Tseng Tsai from the National University Hospital says: 'The head injury was likely just incidental.'

He adds the cause of bleeding was most probably due to an arterio venous malformation, a condition from birth involving a fragile tangle of blood vessels, or an aneurysm that ruptured. An aneurysm is a blood-filled bulge in a blood vessel due to a weakening in its wall.

However, head trauma is a common occurrence and can lead to bleeding in the brain and death. The National Neuroscience Institute of Singapore (NNI) says it sees over 200 severe head injuries a year and over 2,000 minor ones.

Serious cases are admitted to intensive care, while follow-up reviews are usually available for minor ones, and patients are told to return if they experience certain symptoms.

These may range from vomiting to nausea, bleeding in the nose and ears, or unusual headaches. For such cases, a computed tomography scan which provides a 3-D image of the brain, is done to determine the problem.

According to Dr Melvyn Tan from AMK Family Clinic, the critical period is usually the first 24 hours following a hard knock. Sometimes, symptoms may not even appear for a week.

He says most of his patients with such injuries are children and about 20 per cent of patients have to be followed up with scans. The elderly are also susceptible because their bones are weak and they are prone to falls.

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