Causes, Prevalence, & Consequences

Causes of Brain Injury

• Brain injury is the leading cause of death and disability in children and young adults.
• Falls are leading causes of TBI for persons ages 65 and older.
• Transportation-related injuries is the leading cause among persons ages 15 to 64.

Injury and Disability Prevalence Rates

50% of all people with brain injury died 30 years ago; that number now has been reduced to 22%. More people are surviving brain injury than ever before.

• 400,000 with spinal cord injuries
• 500,000 with cerebral palsy
• 2 million Americans with epilepsy
• 3 million Americans with stroke disabilities
• 4 million with Alzheimer's disease
• 5 million Americans with persistent mental illness
• 5.3 million Americans with TBI disability
• 7.3 million Americans with mental retardation

Possible Consequences of Brain Injury

Physical Changes

• Seizures of all types
  
• Muscle spasticity
  
• Double vision or low vision, even blindness
  
• Loss of smell or taste
  
• Speech impairments such as slow or slurred speech
  
• Headaches or migraines
  
• Fatigue, increased need for sleep
  
• Balance problems
  
• Motor coordination

Thinking Changes

• Short-term memory loss; long-term memory loss
  
• Slowed ability to process information
  
• Trouble concentrating or paying attention for periods of time
  
• Difficulty keeping up with a conversation; other communication difficulties such as word finding problems
  
• Spatial disorientation
  
• Organizational problems & impaired judgment
  
• Unable to do more than one thing at a time
  
• A lack of initiating activities, or once started, difficulty in completing tasks without reminders
  
• Decision making difficulties
  
• Sequencing difficulties
  
• Inflexibility
  
• Self-perception
  
• Persistence

Personality and Behavioral Changes

• Depression
  
• Social skills problems
  
• Mood swings
  
• Inappropriate behavior
  
• Inability to inhibit remarks
  
• Problems with emotional control
  
• Difficulty . . .
  
  • relating to others
    
  • maintaining relationships
    
  • forming new relationships
    
  • interpreting social cues
    
• Stress, anxiety, frustration
  
• Egocentric behaviors;
  difficulty seeing how behaviors can affect others