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Local mom starts support group to help with the aftermath of teen brain injury
Mount Pisgah Academy senior Kyle Harrington plans to study physical therapy next year at Asheville- Buncombe Technical Community College. "I've been through it," he said. "I know what there is to know."
Two years ago, Harrington was riding in the back of a Honda Prelude on Monte Vista Road in Candler that hit a tree, spun around and dropped about 40 feet. Harrington suffered a traumatic brain injury that put him in a coma for 10 days and led to six weeks of physical therapy and other rehabilitation at Asheville's Thoms Rehabilitation Hospital. To help families cope with the aftermath of brain injuries, Kyle's mother, Karen Harrington, started a support group for teenagers with brain injuries.
Tina Lispcomb, nurse case manager at Thoms specializing in neurological diagnoses, said it's the only brain injury support group in the state that targets teens, a demographic with unique social and developmental challenges resulting from this type of injury. "It's an age group that needs social interaction more than others," she said, "and their social skills can be impaired as a result of the injury."
Karen Harrington said the group includes five active families and she has been in contact with others from Statesville to Murphy who are interested in participating. Harrington formed the group, she said, "to get together with families that have gone through similar experiences to share resources, provide encouragement, and let people know they are not alone."
You are reborn
Brain injury is a significant cause of death and disability for young adults in the state. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, emergency departments in North Carolina's hospitals handle more than 36,800 people with traumatic brain injuries each year. About 1,800 people die annually from brain injury in the state and about 2,46o acquire lifelong disabilities.
Almost one-third of the brain injuries in North Carolina occur in the 15- to 25-year-old age group, and the majority of those result from trauma to the brain caused by motor vehicle, cycling, skateboarding and other accidents, Lipscomb said. "Teenagers are challenging themselves with active lifestyles and not always being safe," she said.
In addition to traumatic injuries, she added, brain injuries may also be caused by events such as a stroke, aneurysm, tumor or drug overdose, a classification known as an "acquired brain injury."
Damage to the brain can involve localized injury to the brain's structure or disruption to its nerve cells resulting in behavioral, cognitive and physical disabilities, said Dr. Edgardo Diez of PrimeDoc Rehabilitation.
"The brain doesn't have the same integration that it used to," said Diez, who is also chief of staff at Thoms. "You can have all the pieces to the puzzle," he said, "but you don't know how to put it together."
The date of the accident or other cause of the injury, Karen Harrington noted, is referred to by some as a "birthday," as the survivor is often not the same person after the event.
"You are reborn," Harrington noted, echoing what one doctor has said. "They look the same, but they are not the same person - that is part of the difficulty," she said. "Once the physical side heals, people think they are back to normal, but a lot of times the cognitive difficulties can be more devastating."
Dressed in khakis, "etnies" brand sneakers and an Aeropostale T-shirt at a support group gathering, Kyle looks like a typical teenager. But he said he realizes he's not as active and outgoing as he was before the accident. "I recognize the difference," he said. "I can move fast, but I don't really want to." In some ways, Kyle noted, it's easier to hang out with new friends who didn't know him before his injury.
Karen said some observers, including potential employers, can mistake a short attention span or restlessness caused by the injury as a lack of initiative or teenage immaturity. And for teens tasting independence for the first time, the injury can be a devastating setback.
As a result, said CarePartners neurosciences program director Cheryl Wallen, a teen support group fills an important need. "They have people their own age that they can relate to that have experienced similar injuries and dealt with similar social and emotional issues," she said.
Hendersonville's Diana Sapp, whose son Dusty suffered a traumatic brain injury in a car accident one year ago, agreed that support networks are crucial. "You feel very isolated from others, but nobody else gets it like parents or primary care givers. They totally know what I'm talking about. And it's good for the survivors because they can talk to each other."
Dusty said he enjoyed his first gathering of the teen support group. "It was nice being able to see people that understand me," he said, "because they've been brain injured before." Silent epidemic
Thoms Rehabilitation Hospital, a division of CarePartners that operates a 32-bed rehabilitation unit for brain injured patients, recently sponsored a joint Halloween gathering for the local adult, teen and stroke brain injury support groups. "They share a common thread," Wallen said about the 50 people who joined the festivities.
Nationally, about 1.4 million people sustain traumatic brain injuries each year, more than the annual diagnoses of breast cancer, HIV/AIDS, spinal cord injuries and multiple sclerosis combined. The prevalence of brain injury has led health professionals to deem it a silent epidemic.
Lynn Williams, who heads the adult support group known as the Smoky Mountain Brain Injury Association, has suffered two brain aneurisms. "I've gotten as far as I have because of Thoms Rehabilitation and an A-B Tech class," she said.
A-B Tech instructor Jean Alvarez, who teaches a continuing education class for adults with brain injuries, said it's difficult to imagine the challenge some patients face learning to walk and talk again. "I don't think any of us know what it's like to have a traumatic brain injury," she said. "They've had to overcome so much."
The adults in her course are a close-knit group, she noted, who often socialize together outside the classroom. "They are fighters," Alvarez said. "It's a great group of people to know."
Traumatic Brain Injury
A traumatic brain injury occurs when an outside force impacts the head hard enough to cause the brain to move within the skull or if the force causes the skull to break and directly hurts the brain.
These injuries can occur from motor vehicle crashes, firearms, falls, sports, and physical violence, such as hitting or striking with an object. Concussions, also called "closed head injuries," are a type of traumatic brain injury.
In addition, a rapid acceleration and deceleration of the head can force the brain to move back and forth across the inside of the skull, pulling apart nerve fibers and causes damage to brain tissue.
Acquired brain injury
An acquired brain injury occurs after birth and is not hereditary, congenital, or degenerative. Acquired brain injury takes place at the cellular level within the brain; it therefore can affect cells throughout the entire brain, instead of just in specific areas as with traumatic brain injury. Acquired brain injury can result from events such as heart attack, stroke, intra-cranial tumors, toxic exposure, near-drowning or electrical shock.
Impact of Brain Injury
The effects of a brain injury are complex and vary greatly from person to person, depending on such factors as cause, location, and severity.
When a brain injury occurs, the functions of the neurons, nerve tracts, or sections of the brain can be affected. This can change the way a person thinks, acts, feels, and moves the body. Brain injury can also change the complex internal functions of the body. Some symptoms may appear right away, others may not show up for days or weeks. People may look fine although they think and act differently. And sometimes the injury makes it difficult for people to recognize or admit they are having problems.
Symptoms of traumatic brain injury include difficulty speaking, slowed thought processing speed, memory problems, poor attention span, irritability and inappropriate emotional responses.
Most symptoms of acquired brain injuries are similar, though some are experienced more frequently. Symptoms of acquired brain injury can include longer lengths of time in a vegetative state, severe behavior problems and muscle movement disorders.
Reprinted with permission. © 2004 Ashville Citizen Times.