Which evaluation tool helps to diagnose the severity of a head injury?

The Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) is a widely used evaluation tool that assesses a person's level of consciousness following a head injury. It provides a standardized method to measure a patient’s responsiveness and neurological status by evaluating three areas: eye opening, verbal response, and motor response. Each of these areas is assigned a score based on specific criteria, and the total score can range from 3 to 15. A lower score indicates a more severe level of impairment and helps clinicians determine the urgency of intervention required.

In contrast, while the other tools listed—such as the Mini Mental State Examination, Montreal Cognitive Assessment, and Neurobehavioral Cognitive Status Examination—focus on various cognitive functions and can be useful in the context of brain injuries, they do not specifically evaluate the severity of a head injury in the same systematic manner that the GCS does. These tools are more focused on long-term cognitive assessment and are not intended for immediate evaluation of consciousness and responsiveness following acute injuries.