Traumatic Brain Injury

About 35 years ago I applied for a job as the Director of an organization helped victims of TBI, traumatic brain injury. I had some of the qualifications they were seeking, like research and supervising staff, the advanced education, but I didn’t know anything about TBI. So I researched it before the interview. I didn’t get the job, but I never lost my interest in TBI. When I see articles about children’s sports injuries, or NFL brain trauma, or head injuries from auto accidents or falls, I always stop to read them. I’ve known two brilliant women whose careers and lives were devastated in auto accidents during their post graduate college years.

Today I saw an item about a coming conference at OSU, the annual CBI Research Day (Chronic Brain Injury) CBI Research Day | Discovery Themes, The Ohio State University (osu.edu) on March 10. I looked at the qualifications of some of the speakers and for articles they’ve published since I won’t be attending, even virtually. This item about Dr. Christine MacDonald was particularly interesting: Combat concussions worsen over time, not lessen.

“The EVOLVE study, for which she is the lead researcher, found that those who suffer combat concussions worsen over the course of their 1-year and 5-year follow-ups; 80% seek mental health assistance by the 5-year follow-up, and only 19% achieve a “sustained resolution of their symptoms.” The service members had blast or non-blast related concussions, but none had more complex or severe brain injuries.” The Invisible Wounds of War — Concussion Alliance

Electromagnetic controlled cortical impact device for precise, graded experimental traumatic brain injury - PubMed (nih.gov)

Clinical and imaging assessment of acute combat mild traumatic brain injury in Afghanistan (nih.gov)

Cerebellar White Matter Abnormalities following Primary Blast Injury in US Military Personnel (nih.gov)

Amy K. Wagner, MD, Chair for Translational Research at the University of Pittsburgh, is the keynote speaker, and Carrie Lynn Esopenko, PhD, Asst. Professor of Rehabilitation & Movement Sciences at Rutgers is the Spotlight Speaker. 

The database at the University of Pittsburgh, certainly shows some interesting statistics:  Whites (67%) are far more likely to be victims than blacks (19%), an overwhelming number are single--never married, divorced, widowed (67%), males are 73.5%, and 52% of the causes are vehicular crashes.  TBIMS_NationalDB_update.pdf (pitt.edu)

Women in combat

On the Patrick Madrid show (radio talk, Dec. 9) the topic was the recent approval for women in combat. A career female military officer called in and said she disapproved for a reason I'd never thought of: In WWII the USSR lost about 10 million men in combat, but did not draft women, and their population recovered. China has lost females primarily in the womb (abortion, one child policy) and can't recover for many years, if ever. If women of child bearing age are killed in combat there is no way to replace your population. She also mentioned the different physical standards for women in the military, but that has been the case all along. In combat it could be a more serious issue.

The general consensus is that women in combat weakens the military.  There are many, many who call themselves Americans who would like to see this.