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Brain injury has been called the "silent epidemic" since most people don't know about brain injury, let alone its consequences or how it affects people.
What is Brain Injury?
Acquired Brain Injury (ABI) is usually defined as an injury or damage to the brain which is not hereditary, congenital or degenerative that has occurred after birth. Causes of ABI normally include an external forces applied to the head and or neck (traumatic brain injury), anoxic/hypoxic injury ( carbon monoxide poisoning, hemorrhage, airway obstruction, drowning, cardiac arrest), intracranial surgery, infectious diseases, seizure disorders, toxic exposure (ingestion of lead and inhalation of volatile agents, substance abuse) aneurysms, and vascular obstruction (stroke).
Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is defined as an insult to the brain, not of degenerative or congenital nature, caused by an external physical force that may produce a diminished or altered state of consciousness, which results in an impairment of cognitive abilities or physical functioning. It can also result in the disturbance of behavioral or emotional functioning. Traumatic brain injury is the leading cause of death and disability in children and young adults. Shaken Baby Syndrome is a form of traumatic brain injury.
Among all types of injury, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is most likely to cause death or permanent disability.
Levels of Brain Injury
Mild
A mild brain injury is also known as a concussion.
Brief (less than 15 minutes) or NO loss of consciousness.
A dazed, vacant stare right after the injury.
Testing and scans may appear normal.
Symptoms may not appear until later. "Post concussive syndrome" can include temporary headaches, dizzines, mild mental slowing and fatigue. Symptoms of mild brain injury usually improve over 1-3 months.
Moderate
A moderate brain injury is one that is normally the results of a loss of consciousness that can last minutes or a few hours and is followed by a few days or weeks of confusion. Physical, cognitive, and/or behavioral impairments can and may last for months or be permanent.
Severe
Severe brain injury almost always results in prolonged unconsciousness or com which can last days, weeks, or even months.
- The CDC indicates that 5.3 million Americans - a little more than 2% of the U.S. population- currently live with disabilities resulting from brain injury.
- 1.5 million people sustain a brain injury every year.
Every 21 seconds an infant, child, teenager or adult in the U.S. sustains a traumatic brain injury - Each day 4,100 individuals sustain a traumatic brain injury.
- Fewer than 1 in 20 people with traumatic brain injury will receive the rehabilitation that they need.
- TBI is the leading cause of death and disability among children and young adults.
- TBI is the 4th leading cause of death overall.
- TBI results in 1-1/2 times more deaths each year than AIDS.
- Each year 230,000 persons are hospitalized with traumatic brain injury and survive.
- Falls are leading causes of traumatic brain injury for persons 65 and older.
- Transportation related injuries are leading causes of traumatic brain injury among persons 15-64.
- More Americans died as a result of traumatic brain injury between 1981 and 1993 than have been killed in all the wars in our history combined.
- More than 50% of all motor vehicle accidents resulting in TBI involve alcohol.
- Traumatic brain injury accounts for more years of lost productivity than any other injury.
Many of these numbers do not take into account the incidence of other types of Acquired Brain Injury, such as stroke, encephalitis and other infectious diseases, anoxic/hypoxic injury (lack of oxygen to the brain), aneurysms, siezure disorders, surgical procedures, and toxic exposure.
Brain injury has become a national epidemic. There are estimated that more that 50,000 Americans die annually from brain injuries and that over 300,000 have injuries severe enough to require hospitalization. Part of this group, approximately 80,000 people a year are left with cognitive or behavioral deficits of such a degree as to result in lifelong disabilities. Males aged 14 to 24 years are at highest risk. Community facilities for the rehabilitation of persons with brain injury are limited and in many areas nonexistent. As a result, survivors of brain injury have often been silently and shamefully closeted away in psychiatric institutions or nursing homes.
Read more links to brain injury traumatic resources
Brain injury Organization
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