Medical Monday - Traumatic Brain Injuries

PRESQUE ISLE, Maine (WAGM) -

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month. On this week’s Medical Monday with Korrin Patterson we learn more about traumatic brain injuries.

Traumatic brain injuries can have a real affect on people’s lives. Robby Desjardins, Speech language pathologist with Northern Light AR Gould explains what a traumatic brain injury is and some of the symptoms a person might experience.

“Traumatic brain injury is any sort of open or closed head injury that causes some differences in the way the brain is normally working. So that can include behavioral changes, mood changes, functioning in a person’s ability to walk, talk, eat, swallow, use their hands. So it’s any sort of open injury or closed head injury that would affect the normal function of the body.”

Desjardins says a traumatic brain injury can affect anyone at any age and medical attention should be sought as soon as possible.

“I think especially with traumatic brain injury it’s important to get to your doctor and start getting treatment as soon as possible. the brain is pretty mailable, for most people we have a certain level of neuroplasticity, that you know that we all have even well into you know, some advancing age, but you’ve gotta start working on that right away. So if you suspect you have a head injury, a traumatic brain injury, get yourself to the doctor because the faster you get seen, the faster that we can get you in and find out what’s happening. The faster we can get you back to what you were doing before with more ease.”

Desjardins adds an additional word of advice

“I wish people knew that concussion and even a small, even though it doesn’t show up on imaging, ct, mri’s, all the time, but even a small concussion is a brain injury. So repeated concussions over time, whether you do contact sports or whether you’ve had any sort of insult to the head. Those compound over time and can become more of traumatic brain, more of an issue with traumatic brain injury than a person thinks.”

Desjardins says a speech language pathologist will evaluate you and make a plan with you for treatment to help you with your cognitive and motor functions. If you have or think you may have suffered a brain injury, reach out to your primary care physician.

Korrin Patterson, NewsSource 8

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