A Shock Wave of Brain Injuries -- (TBI's)

A Shock Wave of Brain Injuries

www.washingtonpost.com

About 1,800 U.S. troops, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs, are now suffering from traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) caused by penetrating wounds. But neurologists worry that hundreds of thousands more -- at least 30 percent of the troops who've engaged in active combat for four months or longer in Iraq and Afghanistan -- are at risk of potentially disabling neurological disorders from the blast waves of IEDs and mortars, all without suffering a scratch.

For the first time, the U.S. military is treating more head injuries than chest or abdominal wounds, and it is ill-equipped to do so. According to a July 2005 estimate from Walter Reed Army Medical Center, two-thirds of all soldiers wounded in Iraq who don't immediately return to duty have traumatic brain injuries.

(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 2007/4/7 by JacKatMtn]

This is just another danger our fighting men/women are having to deal with on a daily basis in Iraq.

When our Veterans come home it is imperitive that we give them the proper medical attention.

I have a thread here where I am going to log stories on the treatment of our brave servicemen/women. Veterans Treatment

www.washingtonpost.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

The problem is that as the armor improves, you see more brain injuries. There were just as many in WWII and Vietnam, but many of the soldiers suffering them didn't survive long enough from their injuries to find out more about how to treat them. Now that we have Kevlar and newer armor systems they're surviving the initial injury, and then having to deal with the TBI. A TBI is an incredibly difficult injury to deal with or treat. I feel for the soldiers and families that have to go through dealing with them.

This didn't take long, having just read the Wash Post article, I started thinking "why now?", I think I have found the answer....

TissueGene vet launches biotech, nabs license deals

RemeGenix hopes to prosper where its predecessors haven't. Its first drug candidate is a small-molecule compound that treats traumatic brain injury, whose complexity has foiled most biotechs' past attempts at drug trials.

But with its wide reach -- afflicting 1.4 million Americans annually, from professional athletes to car crash victims to military soldiers -- the U.S. traumatic brain injury (TBI) market poses an annual $500 million potential. A Department of Defense supplemental appropriations bill, passed by the Senate last week and awaiting final action, included $83 million for TBI treatments and $100 million for TBI research.

So much for the servicepersonnel, it look like again this is about $$$$$$$$$$

As long as it works, and it provides some comfort to them, let it be. But the main reason our service personnel are seeing more TBIs than before is that more of them are surviving things they wouldn't have before. So now they have to come up with a way to treat them, because they're on a scale that hasn't been seen before.

You are right Zaphod, hopefully a treatment can be found to help the Veterans, it is just this:

the U.S. traumatic brain injury (TBI) market poses an annual $500 million potential

That gets me riled up, hence their true intentions become obvious...

It does me too, but having seen what people with TBI go through, I'm willing to let that go for now, and pray that they find something that works. It's really a brutal injury and it takes away your life.

Just to throw this in there.

There saying that 30% of them might have brain damage from mortars?

If you ask me this sounds like something was discovered / something huge happened,
and it has to be kept hush hush, what better way to keep something quiet
then by a convienant "head injury"?