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Reported in the Senate, S. 801, the Caregiver and Veterans Health Services Act of 2009, would provide comprehensive supports for caregivers of veterans who sustained severe injuries after September 11, 2001. The bill has been approved by the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee and is awaiting floor action.

To take action and support this bill, click on the link below to be directed to our legislative action center!

http://capwiz.com/bia/home

The Committee investigated the findings of a recent study done by the University of Michigan regarding the prevalence of brain injuries among former football players. The study raised significant health concerns about concussions and how they may contribute to lasting effects starting at both the professional and amateur levels.

BIAA is committed to assisting in the awareness campaign to educate coaches, parents, and players regarding the dangers of concussion.

BIAA will continue to monitor the situation closely and alert grassroots advocates if any action is necessary.

Our efforts at the Capitol this year have resulted in a lessening of the impact in reductions to services to those with brain injury. We were successful in not being singled out for deeper reductions in the final Budget as approved by the Legislature and Governor. Starting in January we will be back on the front lines fighting the budget battles once again. The State has yet to turn the corner on this recession.

The joint Senate hearing by the Senate Health Committee and Senate Veterans Committee that was scheduled for this Fall has been postponed until January due to the pending nuptials of Senator Elaine Alquist (D-San Jose), chair of the Senate Health Committee. We are excited about this hearing, and look forward to reporting more details to you in the very near future.

Michael Taylor
On Sunday, April 8, 1989, my day started off as normal as a day can start off for a Sheriff. I was advised of a burglar alarm that was going off at a market in Madera. I proceeded to the market when I was involved in my accident. A Bronco towing a boat, traveling 55 mph, smashed into my patrol car on the driver’s side. I was flown to a hospital in Fresno where I was in a coma for 10 days. After awakening from my coma, I was released to my mom’s care. I was then enrolled into Neurological Retraining Center (N.R.C.). I was with N.R.C. until December 1989. Then I started putting my life together again. I started attending CORC meeting in Fresno. I was very active with CORC. Then February, 2008 I attended the 1st Annual Walk For Thought in Bakersfield. Since I had a good car and was able to drive with no problems, I volunteered to drive down to the Walk with 4 others in my car. That was the day I met Dianna Bolen and her service dog, Sierra. Little did I know, she was the answer to a prayer I made to God shortly after my new life with TBI started.

Now Dianna and Sierra are a big part of my life. All the way down and all the way back home, I kept looking in my rear view mirror at her, (and she has said to me that she never knew I was looking at her). After seeing each other for a few weeks, I volunteered my service (along with another TBI friend) and we built a redwood deck in the back of her condo. From that day on, we have never been separated. After a few months, I got down on my knees and proposed to her. She has told me several times that if Sierra didn’t approve of me, she would have to decline. Needless to say, Sierra is just as much a part of my life than she is to Dianna.

Michael & Dianna
We feel that if it wasn’t for the Walk For Thought in Bakersfield, we would have never gotten to know each other. We help each other to overcome the many obstacles we have to deal with since our accidents. We thank the California Brain Injury Association for organizing that awesome Walk that put us together and we will always have a special place in our “head” for that great Walk!

The research, described in the August 26 edition of Radiology, provides compelling evidence that concussions involve brain damage. The findings suggest that diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), the brain scanning method used by the Einstein scientists, could help in diagnosing concussions and in assessing the effectiveness of treatments.

“DTI has been used to look at other brain disorders, but this is the first study to focus on concussions,” said Michael Lipton, M.D., Ph.D., associate director of the Gruss Magnetic Resonance Research Center (MRRC) and associate professor of radiology, of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, and of neuroscience at Einstein and lead author of the study. “It proved to be a powerful tool for detecting the subtle brain damage that we found to be associated with concussions.”

Each year, more than one million Americans sustain a concussion (technically referred to as mild traumatic brain injury). Concussions in adults result mainly from motor vehicle accidents or falls. While most people recover from concussions with no lasting ill effects, as many as 30 percent suffer permanent impairment — undergoing a personality change or being unable to plan an event. A 2003 federal study called concussions “a serious public health problem” that costs the U.S. an estimated $80 billion a year.

At present, diagnosis of concussions is based primarily on the patient’s accident history and on clinical examinations that check for common concussion symptoms including headache, dizziness and behavioral abnormalities. There is no way of knowing from these exams who will suffer the most severe consequences and who will recover quickly. The results of the Einstein study indicate DTI scanning could provide a more objective way to diagnose concussions, determine whether brain injury has actually occurred following trauma, and possibly predict the lasting loss of executive function. Executive function refers to the ability to make decisions, organize, set priorities and manage time.

The Einstein research involved 20 people known to have suffered concussions (18 from motor vehicle accidents and two from falls) and 20 healthy control subjects. The patients were recruited from one hospital emergency room; two of them had lost consciousness, but only for a few minutes. Both the patients and control subjects underwent conventional brain imaging with magnetic resonance (MR) and computed tomography (CT) scanning, plus a battery of neuropsychological tests to assess executive function, which is often impaired after a concussion. All concussion patients underwent brain imaging and testing within two weeks of their accidents.

Experienced reviewers who evaluated the conventional MR and CT images of patients and controls found no abnormalities in either group. However, the neuropsychological results showed that the patients performed significantly worse than the controls on tests of executive function.

Patients and controls also underwent diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), a recently developed MRI-based imaging technique that can detect subtle changes in the brain by measuring the diffusion of water in the brain’s white matter. DTI revealed abnormal brain regions in 15 of the concussion patients, while no abnormal regions were found in controls. Most importantly, the presence of major areas of structural damage in concussion patients (as shown by large alterations in normal water diffusion using DTI) predicted low scores on their executive-function tests. These damaged areas were located mainly in the brain’s prefrontal cortex, which is essential for normal executive function and is susceptible to injury in concussion.

Dr. Lipton notes that use of DTI could prompt doctors to begin treatment early, when it’s likely to be most useful. “The problems in functioning caused by concussions often don’t become evident until weeks or months after the injury, suggesting that the brain pathology may actually expand over time,” he notes. “By detecting brain injury early with DTI and then initiating cognitive rehabilitation therapies for those patients, we may be able to limit the effects of concussions.”

“We are really excited by these findings,” indicates Craig Branch, Ph.D., a co-author of the study and director of the Gruss MRRC. “For the first time we appear to be able to identify the subtle pathology sometimes caused by concussion, providing researchers a ‘pathology target’ for the development of therapies to reduce or eliminate the damage identified by this novel imaging method.” Dr. Lipton adds that DTI could help in evaluating the effectiveness of existing therapies for concussion.

A passenger who sustained traumatic brain injuries in a multi-vehicle crash while on his way to a camping trip was awarded $49 million. In 2007, Drew Bianchi, then a 21-year-old college student, was in a sedan on Route 152, also known as the Pacheco Pass. Michael Demma and Samuel Bimbela were driving trucks toward each other when they collided at or near the center line, causing Bimbela to lose control of his Peterbilt truck and broadside the Bianchi vehicle. Bianchi was in a coma for about a month and is expected to require 24-hour care for the rest of his life. Plaintiff’s counsel claimed that Bimbela was sleep-deprived and Demma was on a cell phone while driving. Bianchi settled with the state in July for $10 million on his claim of dangerous condition of public property. Of Bianchi’s award, he received $27.6 million for future medical care.

Bianchi v. Demma

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According to recent reports, both the House and Senate are expected to debate their health measures simultaneously sometime in early November.

BIAA will continue to monitor the situation closely and alert grassroots advocates if any action is necessary.

With this news providing momentum, the Senate Finance Committee is expected to vote on October 13, 2009 to clear the bill. A final vote in the Finance Committee will open the door for negotiations to begin on melding that draft with the one previously approved by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Once that process has been completed, the final bill may be considered by the full Senate as early as the week of October 19, 2009.

BIAA will continue to monitor the situation closely and alert grassroots advocates if necessary.