[Research] Brain Injuries

[RobinN]

I just received Dr Blaylock's latest newsletter. This article was in it, and I thought it might be of interest to those of you that have suffered brain injuries.

New Thinking for Brain Injuries
As a neurosurgery resident, one of my main interests was head injuries, particularly looking for the mechanism for what was termed delayed injury, which accounts for a large part of the effects of traumatic brain injury.
We know that after someone’s head is injured a gradual deterioration occurs in the brain in specific areas that can continued for days, weeks, or even years after the injury.
In my book, “Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills, (www.blaylockwellnesscenter.com) I proposed that this delayed damage was due to a buildup of the excitotoxin glutamate within the brain.
Since then, a considerable amount of data has accumulated supporting my hypothesis. Attention to this delayed process increased tremendously
when it was realized that sports-related head injuries, especially in professional football players, could result in a similar process that can persist for decades after a series of minor concussions and can end up causing a special form of dementia called chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE.
Pathologically, the brains of these football players closely resembles what is seen in Alzheimer’ s disease. This has baffled neuroscientists and neurosurgeons and thus far they have no clue as to why this is so.
I have been working with a friend of mine, Dr. Joseph Maroon, to solve this puzzle. He is chief of neurosurgery at the University of Pittsburgh, and he is the team neurosurgeon for the Pittsburgh Steelers. I discussed my new hypothesis with Dr. Maroon and he was quite excited about the hypothesis and feels it is the answer.
When the brain is injured repeatedly, as seen with football players, the brain’s microglia are activated (called priming). These are the cells that control brain inflammation — they also contain large amounts of glutamate.
With the first concussion, these cells are primed for action for very long periods, even years. The second concussion and subsequent concussions cause a hyper-reaction of the microglia, causing them to secret large amounts of several excitotoxins — glutamate, aspartate, and quinolinic acid as well as powerful inflammatory cytokines and chemokines (inflammatory chemicals).
What I have shown is that these excitotoxins can produce the exact pathological findings as seen with CTE. I have named this process immunoexcitotoxicity. We plan to publish our results in a medical journal in the near future.
We are also planning to conduct a series of in- depth studies on the process as well.
There are a number of natural products that hold the promise of stopping the delayed effects of CTE, thus protecting the athlete from this devastating disorder. More on this to come.

 

[foul ball]

I have had epilepsy all my life. However, I didn't have a t/c until I was 33 yrs old.

Growing up I had thousands of very strong, aura like, deja vu spells that I still have today. These spells would leave me confused for hours. I had seen our family doctor, but nothing was ever done, it was the 1950's. I ended up accepting the spells as part of life.

Durning military service I was in an accident that nearly fractured my skull. I was knocked out cold, broke my jaw, knocked out teeth and recieved many stitches.

To my point--knowing that I do have epilepsy, could the accident, not epliepsy, cause the t/c events 11 years later? Would damage show up on a mri? I don't believe I ever discussed the accident with my neurologist.

 

[Endless]

Hey there, foul ball. Head injuries can cause epilepsy (seizures). And it can show up years after the injury, after many years of being seizure-free. The head injury may or may not show up on an MRI, but probably would on a PET scan.

 

[foul ball]

Thanks Endless.

 

[RobinN]

Epilepsy is only a label for seizure activity. The cause certainly could have be your accident. I would suggest discussing it with your doctor. Also, you should know that neurofeedback has shown great results for people with brain injury.

 

[sandi]

Drs?

Well ya got to be able to get a Dr first . I went to Dr Blaylock site I am a bit skeptical of Web Dr's! When you find one they have to be on the same wave lenght . If you don't have a match it's a no go.

For me the first symptom didn't show until 3 days then it got worse through 2-3 months, some things are better, some didn't change, some I retaught myself,
some I give up on!
But try telling a Dr, cause they just brand you a nut!
When the meds don't work they say your not taking them correctly ! (Excuse me but I'd rather not sleep 24/7)What is the quality of my life sleeping!

 

[Karen Nichols]

neurofeedback

I am new here, so I may not be following the proper protocol for asking a question. I am very interested to learn more about Robin's daughter's experience with neurofeedback and if she is still doing it, how long she did it, etc.

My son, age 6, is diagnosed with Doose syndrome and his seizures have been mostly med-resistant. He is on the Keto diet, which has helped some, but he still has seizures. Many medicines have made him worse. We are currently starting neurofeedback and I want to get a sense of how long, how often you did the treatments. We are travelling 3 hours ( one way) to do the treatments and I wonder how often we need to be doing this. So far ( just 3 weeks and 10 treatments), it has seemed to be effective, but it is a bit early to tell.

Thank you,

Karen

 

[epileric]

Welcome Karen

Robin has documented her daughters treatment in the "history Book" in the "library". http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com/forums/f32/neurofeedback-rebeccas-story-2733/

You'll also find other people documenting their various treatments there.

As for protocol, asking question is how we learn things. I would suggest you introduce yourself in the "foyer" so we can learn a bit about you & give you the welcome you deserve (unless you're really shy). And please don't double post (same post in more than one place on this site).

 

[imaayafa]

how, briefly, might neurofeedback help someone who suffered traumatic brain/head injury?
foul ball: your story sounds remarkably similar to my husband. he had a severe head injury during his military service at age 19, which resulted in a coma. it took him only a few months to recover physically but recovering his memory and concentration is a life project. he had first and only t/c at age 33 (last year). his neurologists told him that it is very common for head injury to lead to seizures even many years later. nothing interesting showed on his mri. he often experiences deja vu, which apparantly is also common from tbi.

 

[Nakamova]

imaayafa --

Neurofeedback is a method of gradually re-training the brain to produce healthy brainwaves. For someone with a seizure disorder -- even one resulting from TBI -- there is the potential for their brain to develop the ability to maintain those healthy brainwaves by itself. It's like doing physical therapy to restore strength and flexibility.

 

[neilB]

Hi Fould Ball,

I had a traumatic brain injury as a result of being hit by a car. 6 months later I had my first tonic clonic. Never had any seizures before that and the one thing my neurologist warned me about was the "possibility" of a seizure. Well 6 months later I was on Dilantin, then tegretol and now keppra and it's been about 7 years (I actually forget the exact length of time)

 

[Endless]

This is just my opinion, but....

I have a personal interest in this topic, and have been reading up. People don't take small head injuries seriously, when the research shows that if mild brain injuries are repeated ones they are enough to cause seizures or other neurological issues.

I think I've had seizures since I was a teen. We suspect my father had epilepsy, too, so it may be hereditary. I've had numerous mild concussions from sports and a couple of car accidents, and after doing some reading I think that over time they may have made my seizures worse. Some of the head blows were multiples during one day or a week (like falling off a crazy horse multiple times)

Mild head injuries usually don't show up on an MRI. Brain damage is often at the microscopic level. It takes a PET scan (that shows decreased glucose uptake) or autopsy after death to see them. So sometimes brain injuries as a cause of neurological problems are overlooked.

For those who already have seizures, even mild head injuries can make those seizures worse: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15376487

Even mild concussions can cause neurological problems:
http://www.neuroskills.com/tbi/injury.shtml
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb4365/is_7_42/ai_n31612027/
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2377/6/7

Research on football players has shown that repeated head injuries don't even need to be serious ones to do damage. Mild brain injuries can cause seizures or other neurological problems years later. Not just sports - for example whiplash, too.

http://www.brainandspinalcord.org/r...in-injury/seizure-traumatic-brain-injury.html

Look starting page 752. This textbook mentions the cumulative impact of several mild head injuries.

Here's info on second impact syndrome, applicable to sports, victims of domestic violence, or anyone else who takes more than one knock to the head in a short time period: http://www.headinjury.com/sports.htm

This is an attorney's site, but it's still good. Very clear explanation of the types of brain injuries: http://www.braininjury.com/injured.html

The studies seem to show that one mild head injury isn't likely to increase someone's chances of developing seizures. (The chance of seizures increases with the severity of the injury) But most of those studies were relatively short term (under 5 years). So I think there needs to be more studies on long term effects.

 

[imaayafa]

i think there is an article in the nytimes (on its website ) about neurofeedback and neurological function.

there have also been numerous reports lately about the cumulative effects of concussions/multiple head injuries.

fyi, very serious brain injuries also do not necessarily show on mri's, as you said, bc it could be at the cellular and not the tissue level.

 

[RobinN]

Worth following her research if you suffer from TBI

Lauren C. Frey, MD
Dr. Frey is interested in the processes of the development of epilepsy after traumatic brain injury. Only about 20% of people who survive severe traumatic brain injury will develop epilepsy. Developing tools to predict which survivors will develop epilepsy offers clues about the changes in brain structure necessary for the occurrence of epilepsy. It will also allow physicians to identify, and aggressively treat, TBI survivors at highest risk of developing epilepsy in hopes of preventing seizures altogether. Dr. Frey is a Faculty Associate of the Colorado Injury Control Research Center and a Faculty Affiliate in the University of Colorado’s graduate Neurosciences Program.

 

[Cint]

Worth following her research if you suffer from TBI

She is a colleague of my epileptologist at UCHSC, where I go.