The Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) is a clinical tool used to assess a patient's level of consciousness, typically after a traumatic brain injury. It evaluates three aspects of responsiveness: eye-opening (E), verbal response (V), and motor response (M).
The total score ranges from 3 (deep coma) to 15 (fully alert).
(Mnemonic: Move 654)
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Motor response (Mo) 6 points |
Verbal response (V)
|
Eye opening (E) |
|
Obeys commands - 6 |
|
|
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Localizes pain - 5 |
Oriented - 5 |
|
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Withdraws from pain- 4 |
Confused conversation - 4 |
Spontaneous - 4 |
|
Abnormal flexion |
Inappropriate words - 3 |
To speech - 2 |
|
Abnormal extension |
Incomprehensible sounds - 2 |
To pain - 1 |
|
No response - 1 |
No response - 1 |
No response - 1 |
|
Severity |
GCS score |
|
Minor head injury |
15 with no LOC |
|
Mild head injury |
14 / 15 with LOC |
|
Moderate head injury |
9-13 |
|
Severe head injury |
3-8 |