Knocked unconcious on a pirate ship

[sunsalute]

Can I pick a medical brain about how you'd care for someone that was knocked unconcious with a blow to the head? If there's experience with how it feels and how to describe waking up, that would also be super amazing. I know it's super dangerous and requires a hospital visit but this is fic-land and historical and they're on a pirate ship so we're ignoring that small tidbit.

Setting: I'm not going to lie, this is pretty vague. Whatever Pirates of the Carribbean is, ish? On a ship belonging to a relatively well-respected naval officer who's just picked up someone with an 'or alive' bounty. As little crew as they can get away with.

The Knockening: poor Character is headbutted into unconciousness. They stay unconcious long enough to be moved to another ship.

The questions:
-how long can they stay unconcious before breaking suspension of disbelief
-how would someone used to dragging unconcious bodies around check up on Character as they wake up
-how does it feel to wake up after such a blow
-assuming no lasting damage, what temporary damage can Character expect?

Thank you so much!

Comments

[michelel72]

However, I am constantly reading fiction with people knocked out for hours with no sequelae, so I think most people would be willing to suspend their disbelief for an hour or so.

I am still salty about a fanfic in which a character was clonked over the head and was unconscious from that for half an hour but was confident he didn't have a concussion! (And that wasn't meant to be character confusion; the writer really did think a concussion was something separate from the half hour of unconsciousness caused by the blow to the head ....)

[pallas_rose]

Oof. Yeah. But if I back-buttoned from every medical improbability I wouldn't read much! I suspend my disbelief liberally!