Traumatic Brain Injury Awareness Month
Each March, for more than 30 years, the Brain Injury Association of America has engaged in a Brain Injury Awareness campaign to bring attention to the risk factors associated with brain injuries, incidents of these injuries, and the needs of families that have experienced a brain injury.
The theme of the campaign from 2018 – 2020 is Change Your Mind. The goals of #ChangeYourMind are to:
- De-stigmatize those living with brain injuries;
- Empower brain injury survivors and their caregivers; and
- Promote the support that is available to people living with brain injuries.
Below are a few important TBI facts and stats:
Every day, 153 people in the United States die from injuries that include TBI.
TBI is a contributing factor to 30% of all injury-related deaths in the United States.
47% of TBI in the United States are caused be a fall.
In 2012, an estimated 329,290 children (age 19 or younger) were treated in the United States for sports and recreation-related diagnosis of concussion or TBI.
Among all age groups, motor vehicle crashes were the third leading cause of TVI at 14%
Over the span of six years (2007–2013), while rates of TBI-related ER visits increased by 47%, hospitalization rates decreased by 2.5% and death rates decreased by 5%.
People with a TBI, or traumatic brain injury, should be seen by a health care professional soon after the injury is sustained.