The European Head Injury Evaluation Chart (EHIEC) was designed by the European Brain Injury Society to assess head-injured patients from the initial insult to several years following injury. We describe the experience of using the EHIEC in assessing 56 consecutive traumatically brain-injured people admitted to an early inpatient brain injury rehabilitation programme over a 9-month period. An account of its use on admission and at discharge in a subgroup of 40 cases is also given. The difficulties in relation to the length of time to administer the EHIEC, the wording, definition and scoring of items are discussed. We suggest that an instruction manual is required and conclude that, while in its present form it represents a potentially useful checklist, further work is needed to refine the instrument and establish its validity and reliability.