Traumatic brain injury (TBI), according to the World Health Organization, will surpass many diseases as the major cause of death and disability by the year 2020. With an estimated 10 million people affected annually by TBI, the burden of mortality and morbidity that this condition imposes on society, makes TBI a pressing public health and medical problem.  (NeuroRehabilitation. 2007;22(5):341-53. The impact of traumatic brain injuries: a global perspective. Hyder AA1, Wunderlich CA, Puvanachandra P, Gururaj G, Kobusingye OC. Department of International Health and Center for Injury Research & Policy, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA. ahyder@jhsph.edu; http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18162698)

According to research published by the World Health Organisation (WHO), approximately 54 to 60 million people are victims of traumatic brain injury world wide. 2.2 to 3.6 million of these are moderate to severe. In Germany, more than 280,000 people are injured, 73,000 of these children (see also: http://www.pharmazeutische-zeitung.de/index.php?id=1522 and http://www.nachsorgekongress.de/download/nachsorgekongress_presse/2010_Einleitung/nachsorgekongress_presse_2010/2010_ergebnisse_studie/).

To clarify, and I had to look that up myself: A traumatic brain injury (TBI) is an injury to the brain caused by an external force after birth. Common causes of a traumatic brain injury include gunshot wounds, motor vehicle crashes, assaults, or falling and striking your head. An acquired brain injury (ABI) includes all types of traumatic brain injuries and also brain injuries caused after birth by cerebral vascular accidents (commonly known as stroke), and loss of oxygen to the brain (hypoxic brain injury) (http://www.biausa.org/FAQRetrieve.aspx?ID=43913). This means that there are many more people who suffer an ABI than a TBI annually.

Now – what are the figures for Ireland you might ask. I asked, and did a bit of research, asked some of the voluntary organisations involved, checked Government strategy papers, and, guess what? Nobody knows.

I don’t know whether this is ‘scientific’, but if you assume that Ireland has 1/20th of the population of Germany, then 1/20th of 280,000 of TBI victims in Germany could mean 1,400 TBI victims in Ireland annually.

1,400.

For the first time in almost a week, Pádraig went out to the roof terrace to get a bit of fresh air. He also went back to have a bit of chocolate pudding (which, surprisingly, didn’t go down that well) and stewed apples (which he seemed to like much more). We only staid out for three quarters of an hour or so and went back to his room early.

Since we had a bit of time on our hands, I decided to cut his hair. That worked out much better than the last time. I got a bit over-enthusiastic and decided to wash his hair. It’s something most of us do a few times a week, I have heard of people doing it even every day! Hospitals are different.

For a change, Pádraig was lucky. His nurse had a bit of time and gave me a hand. Only when I did it, did I realise that I would most likely have set not just Pádraig and his bed, but his complete under water had I been on my own. The result: a real clean head of beautiful hair, and Pádraig apparently being the most relaxed person on the ward (much more than myself), with a record heart beat of 62 (I was waiting for the alarms to go off, ‘smelling’ hear failure) and an oxygen level of 98.

Finally, this morning I spent some time checking out a device used, amongst others, by gamers to control the characters and actions in the computer games they are playing. It’s a gadget that works like an EEG, only that it costs just a few hundred dollars. Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkbxaukavHs on EMOTIV.

I’m getting one and will try out to which extend it will help Pádraig to interact with the environment surrounding him.