I’m a neurologist, I’ll try to add some context here.
You’re describing an epidural hematoma, which can present with a “lucid interval” of a few hours. That would have been ruled out already with a CT scan. Epidural hematomas are fairly uncommon, caused by an injury to an artery on the inside of the skull (temporal bone) that was quite unlikely to be damaged given where the puck hit Little’s head.
From the way this is described and from what we’ve been told of his condition (he’s alert, he’s being observed), Little probably suffered a contusion of the brain. A contusion is basically a bruise, blood under low pressure seeping into the tissue. No skull fracture is described, which is good news.
Cerebral contusions are usually managed without any surgical intervention. Their outcome depends on how bad the injury is — how much of the brain is damaged, and which part(s). The fact that Little was awake after the injury, and able to skate off, is a good sign.
People can recover fully from smaller cerebral contusions, ones that don’t cause coma or obvious neurological deficits with the initial injury (as seems to be the case here, hopefully).
They aren’t typically the cause of seizures, though there is certainly some risk there.
I guess Little will be kept out of any contact situation until at least the bleeding from the contusion is gone. As with bruises elsewhere in the body, contusions are gradually re-absorbed. That process can take a couple of months.
I’ll be surprised if he’s playing again before the All-Star break. He could miss the rest of the year. But it’s reasonable to hope that he can eventually come back to play again.
