After 25 years serving in the British Army, veteran Robert Milton now finds peace through art as a tool to cope with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
If someone in your life is struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder, you may wonder what to say or how to help. Start by providing a safe space for them to openly describe how they feel.
Although head injuries from biking accidents can be severe, most adults don’t wear helmets. Only 22 percent of adults seriously injured while biking were using a helmet at the time of their accident.
Routine sparring in boxing can cause short-term impairments in brain-to-muscle communication and decreased memory performance, according to new research.
Researchers are beginning to study whether beekeeping has therapeutic benefits. For now, there is little hard data, but veterans insist that it helps them focus, relax and become more productive. The programs are part of a small but growing effort by Veterans Affairs and veteran groups to promote the training of soldiers in farming and other agricultural careers.
The biggest stars in the world are pledging their brains. Young players are leaving the game with their destinies unfulfilled. The stories they tell spark fear and raise questions. And the science hasn't even begun to provide answers.
Scientists at Trinity College Dublin have announced a significant advance in our understanding of mild head trauma (concussive brain injury) and how it may be managed and treated in the future. It seems that repetitive impacts — as opposed to single events — cause the all-important damage to blood vessels in the brain.
9/11 has left behind many victims who are suffering from PTSD. “PTSD doesn’t have a time limit,” said Dr. Jacqueline M. Moline. “People can develop PTSD related to an event years later.” Even now, some survivors replay the disaster in their minds. They have nightmares about it. They jump when they hear loud noises. They avoid anything that reminds them of that day.
Researchers have long known about the connection between concussions sustained on the football field and chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, a neurodegenerative illness caused by repeated head injuries.
But another group of researchers wondered—what about the hits that don’t result in a concussion? They found that even when a player didn’t show outward signs of having a concussion, their brains were showing symptoms of injury.
As research into head injuries expands to include women's soccer, some of the sport's former stars are calling attention to the health fallout from heading the ball multiple times.
Former NFL star Tedy Bruschi spent the last 14 years showing what a stroke survivor could do: continue playing pro football, climb Mount Kilimanjaro, run the Boston Marathon.
Now Bruschi is showing what a two-time stroke survivor can do.
For nearly a decade, Ryan Diviney existed in a vegetative state, a beating heart inside a paralyzed body, the result of being kicked in the head during a catastrophic beating that altered the course of his young life and the lives of those who loved him.
New Jersey has implemented a sweeping new rule restricting full contact football drills to 15 minutes. While praised by some, others have voiced displeasure, wondering how younger and inexperienced players will learn how to tackle effectively.
Similar to the way the National Football League is addressing brain injuries among its players by testing their neuropsychological health at the beginning and end of each season, the Pentagon has in recent years ordered all service members to complete cognitive evaluations before combat deployments, as well as after any blast injuries — such as from an enemy improvised bomb explosion.
Generations of politicians have assumed that openly acknowledging a psychiatric disorder would be disastrous. Jason Kander is testing that assumption.
In a strikingly candid public letter, Mr. Kander announced last October that he was dropping out of the race because of untreated post-traumatic stress disorder from his military service, saying it had become too much for him to bear.
"The Lancet Neurology published a new study concluding that a handheld portable device and blood test could help detect real-time brain injuries, even if a CT scan does not. ...Using only a few drops of blood, assessment of the brain could literally, change lives in a matter of minutes."
Omar Salgado was in a car accident. His liver was slashed. His spine, ribs and a hip were broken. He had something called “a diffuse axonal shear” injury to his brain — the kind of injury that usually puts people into a vegetative state. Salgado woke on Jan. 18, 2016, about three months after his accident, and one day after he turned 22.
Martin Monti and his co-researcher, Caroline Schnakers are hoping to offer a new therapy to patients like Omar, whose consciousness becomes established. They are partnering on a research project that uses an ultrasound device the size of a hockey puck to shake neurons in the brain back into action.
Brittni Souder suffered a traumatic brain injury while playing soccer — part of a growing and perplexing challenge that some of the sport’s leaders and medical officials view as a crisis. Now she is helping young players avoid the same injuries she is still coping with today.
With suicides on the rise, the U.S. government wants to make the national crisis hotline easier to reach. Once implemented, people will just need to dial 988 to seek help.
For 8-million adults who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder in any given year, medication and cognitive therapy have been the treatment protocol. Now, University of Houston assistant professor of electrical engineering Rose T. Faghih is reporting in Frontiers in Neuroscience that a closed-loop brain stimulator, based on sweat response, can be developed not only for PTSD patients, but also for those who suffer an array of neuropsychiatric disorders.
New Mexico state health officials are seeking to shore up and standardize safeguards against brain injuries in youth sports beyond schools in non-scholastic athletic leagues and clubs.
This program is made possible in part by a grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, which is dedicated to ensuring that impacted post-9/11 veterans, service members, and their families are thriving long after they return home.
BrainLine is a national service of WETA-TV, the flagship PBS station in Washington, D.C.
BrainLine, WETA Public Television
2775 South Quincy St. Arlington, VA 22206 E-mail | Phone: 703.998.2020
