Supporting Our Troops – With Brain Training & A Donation Program
It is said that every major war produces a “signature injury.” Society always feels the loss of those who die in battle, but the way most of us experience war is through the surviving veterans who come home and bring with them a new set of medical, scientific, and moral challenges. In World War II, the US’s use of atom bombs lead to an increase in radiation-induced cancer, while the Vietnam War saw the emergence of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Just as those conditions would define war for their respective generations, Traumatic Brain Injury (or TBI) has become the “signature injury” of our current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Research surveys have found that one in five Iraq War veterans reports coming back with a brain injury, and there are many signs that the number of unreported cases is much, much higher. One government organization has estimated that a staggering 83% of Iraq War veterans are coming back with TBI.
Just like generations past, we face a moral imperative to find a cure, and brain training may be the answer. If that seems hard to believe, consider the case of Steven Schulz, a Marine and Iraq War veteran with TBI whose mother Debbie recently told us his story. Like the majority of the soldiers who suffer from TBI, Steven was caught in the blast of an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) and has struggled to lead a normal life ever since. Steven suffered extensive physical injuries, including the loss of half his line of vision in one eye and all of his vision in the other. The damage to his brain made it so that he could barely pay attention to anything, like movies or conversations, for more than about three minutes. Debbie was pleased to report that after a few months training with the Brain Fitness Program, Steven has made remarkable progress. He can now participate in conversations more easily, and Debbie told me he even managed to sit through an entire movie recently while following the plot and remembering who each character was. Steven is still a long way from a full recovery, but when it comes to TBI, any progress is worth investigating further- and worth celebrating.
As more of our troops come home from Iraq (and as more head over to Afghanistan) this problem is going to become even more prevalent, and if it goes unaddressed, more dangerous. Specialists in TBI are most concerned about those who, unlike Steven, aren’t even aware they have TBI. Army physical therapy technician Dennis Russell was quoted in this article that “unit leaders don’t always pick up on the symptoms, or they confuse them with post-traumatic stress.” If we don’t do something to raise awareness about this problem, many soldiers may end up with severe mental processing problems that they can’t explain – maybe even months or years down the line.
With that in mind, here at Posit Science are starting a new campaign on our Facebook page dedicated to raising awareness about TBI among veterans. Here’s how it works: for each of you who goes to Facebook and plays our 60-second brain game, we will donate a dollar to the Wounded Warrior Project, an organization dedicated towards raising awareness and assisting the ever-growing number of wounded service men and women in this country. The game is fun and quite addictive, so challenge yourself and your friends to see how well you do. It’s just a small way you can help out and give hope to people like Steven. Believe me, they need it right now.
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Posted: Benefits of Brain Fitness, Brain exercise, Brain Fitness Marketing, Brain Fitness Program, Brain plasticity, Exercise, Memory, Posit Science software
Posit Science's corporate blog is the place where our employees share their thoughts about Posit Science and its products, brain fitness, breakthroughs in neuroscience, and any other topic they find interesting and relevant. 
April 1st, 2010 at 4:50 pm
Cyrus stated, “….we face a moral imperative to find a cure, and brain training may be the answer.”
This is a problematic statement that is part of the struggle many mTBI, TBI and PCS sufferers face. When we get real and speak of treating mTBI, TBI, and PCS, there will be a greater acceptance of the incurable symptoms of these injuries. The denial of the long term effects of brain injuries hampers the need for better prevention, better diagnosis, and better acceptance of the injured.
An injured brain will no more recover to pre-injury condition that my partially amputated little finger will regrow to full length.
Brain Training has great potential at helping the brain injured recover as much function as possible. Some will have miraculous recoveries to an almost ‘like pre-injury’ condition. Others will struggle for the rest of their lives.
Recovery from a brain injury is a three fold issue. Recover the skills that can be retrained. Develop the skill sets to work-around some of the symptoms such as memory tricks, concentration skills, etc. Then, accepting that some dysfunctions will be life-long.
Society needs to understand that these residual dysfunctions do not devalue the person. We have so many protected classes of people. Too bad the brain injured are currently not one of them.
The minor efforts required to accommodate those with residual dysfunctions are rarely offered. With the many injured Iraq and Afghanistan Vets, maybe society will have the critical mass of brain injured to finally start making those minor efforts of accommodation.
That “moral imperative” will hopefully become accommodating the brain injured.
April 7th, 2010 at 8:06 am
@Mark: “An injured brain will no more recover to pre-injury condition that my partially amputated little finger will regrow to full length.”
Doom-and-gloom statements like this do nothing to help anyone. Yes, we need to accept people the way they are. But, everyone has the right to hope and work toward better conditions for themselves.
People have regained function to pre-injury conditions, not necessarily from this game, but it has been done. Just because you’ve never heard of it, doesn’t mean it hasn’t been done. Will everybody recover to that point? Perhaps not. But, some do. No one has the right to take that hope away from anyone.
BTW, there have been cases, albeit rare, of amputated limbs regrowing. Do your research.
May 28th, 2010 at 8:53 am
this article can’t possibly be true. 60% of the soldiers that go to Iraq sit in offices and walk around FOB’s in their pt gear… Of all the soldiers that are actually in line troops, only a handful of them suffer real cases of TBI. I agree that it is a serious threat to soldiers but to assume that 1 in 5 soldiers get TBI is ridiculous. Maybe out of the 1 in 5 soldiers that actually go outside the wire 1 in 5 of those have TBI but that is it. The others have, “I wish I was a real combat soldier so I will pretend the war ‘scared me’ so I can drop the Iraq card to my family and friends and get attention …disease.” That disease is a pandemic.
May 28th, 2010 at 8:54 am
regardless of how bogus this research is you should donate to the Wounded Warrior Fund
May 28th, 2010 at 9:30 am
@Jake – the 1 in 5 thing is not an assumption, it’s based on a variety of news and military sources. The source linked to above, where he got the the 1 in 5 figure, is from this NPR article:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106321923
As well, this article in the New England Journal of Medicine reports that ~15% of Iraq soldiers experience a mild TBI/concussion. That does not account for more serious brain injury.
This 22-month study done by the US Army reports 18% TBI rate in returning soldiers.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/04/ap_carson_braininjury_070411/
So it would appear that the 1 in 5 is not totally out of left field…
June 11th, 2010 at 9:58 am
At 55 years old I had a severe subdural hematoma on 12/5/08 that required 3 craniotomies to save my life. When I awoke from a coma I had zero memory, no ability to comprehend speech, I could not breathe on my own and I did not know how to walk. By the time i was released from outpatient therapy I had about 50% of my pre injury cognitive skills. The doctors and therapists told me they helped me as much as possible.
I was lucky and found a brilliant speech-languaguage pathologist who is skilled in the use of Posit products and other cognitive learning techniques. With her guidance, my hard work and wonderful support from my family I have progressed to about 85% of my pre-injury cognitive skills. I still have bad days, and I fatigue late in the day but I feel like I have a real chance to succeed. Before I met this therapist I felt like my life was going to be a total waste. I could not focus, I had terrible vision issues, my cognitive processing was so slow and I was very depressed.
The techniques and protocols that this therapist uses has helped many TBI patients. I am only one of growing number of patients. I do not believe the average TBI patient can accomplish what I did without professional help. The Posit products should be used in conjunction with skills that a trained therapist can offer. The bottom line is that there is help for people with severe TBIs. I don’t know how many therapists can do what my therapist did for me but maybe we should find out.
June 11th, 2010 at 10:22 am
Thank you for sharing your story, Ike. It sounds like it has taken you a lot of hard work to get where you are, and for that we commend you.