For Families
Today, thanks to modern life-saving techniques, victims are able to survive war wounds, car accidents, and various kinds of other accidents more often than ever before. But, unfortunately, surviving doesn’t mean coming back as good as new. Today, there is practically an epidemic of traumatic brain injury – a staggering 6.3 million Americans disabled by TBI.
We don’t read about TBI in the daily papers the way we read about heart disease or cancer. It is, in fact, a silent epidemic. Yes, we’ve made extraordinary inroads in the field of brain science since the “decade of the brain” in the 1990’s, but it is the healthy brain that fascinates us – the area of the brain that influence memory, that enable a young child to learn so quickly in the first few years of life, or that help us to solve problems or survive tragedy. We’ve learned how to make our brains smarter, keeping old age at bay; we’ve learned to strengthen our memory, fine-tune our reactions and improve our perceptions. And we have learned more about the role of the brain’s neurochemistry in addictions, obesity, depression, bipolar disorder and the like.
But we still aren’t sure how to live with TBI.
With all these inroads, all this progress, we still need to rely primarily on symptoms to determine whether someone has had a concussion or a mild head injury. Despite all the advances made in rehabilitation, understanding the way the brain develops and grows, we still have difficulty accepting behavior as a function of the brain, nothing more and nothing less.
When we break a leg, its going to affect the way we walk. If we hurt our brain, it’s going to affect our behavior. So simple, yet still so difficult to grasp.
Whenever any of us have had no prior experience in a specialty area, its complexities seem endless. This is especially true in brain injury, as no one ever volunteers; everyone is drafted. If your loved one has suffered a brain injury, you will need help navigating the confusing symptoms, complex therapies and many different sorts of rehabilitation services ahead of you.
I always say, “Prepare for the worst, but expect the best.” We can fight the aftermath of TBI together.
John W. Cassidy, M.D.
Mindstorms
