University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus (Courtesy Photo) TheUniversity of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus has plans to expand its care of veterans with new brain and mental health care facilities on campus. The university announced Friday it has$47.8 million pledged to create theMarcus Institute for Brain Health and the Steven A. Cohen Military Family Clinic. The institute is expected to open this summer with the clinic following in later months, CUAnschutz said in a release. The Atlanta-based philanthropic organization the Marcus Foundation plans to kick in $38 million over five years for the brain health center. Our intent is to build a network of healing for those who served our country and suffer the invisible wounds of war, said Bernard Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot and creator of theMarcus Foundation, in a statement. The institute will be dedicated to helping military veterans with traumatic brain injury and related psychological health issues. The Cohen Veterans Network in a partnership totaling $9.8 million will work with CU Anschutz to build a mental health clinic to serve veteran and military families in greater Denver with free, or low-cost, personalized care and integrated case management support, according to the news release. Its not easy … Continue reading →

SARATOGA SPRINGS As the date of May 18 gets closer, halfway through Stroke Awareness Month, Tammy Dercole is trying to figure out where shell first make an appearance in her college graduation robe. It will most likely be the office of Dr. Seth Wharton, the neurologist on Wells Street who had encouraged Dercole to obtain a degree after they met several years ago. The doctor tried, with minimal success, to help Dercole regain the use of her left arm that was lost in 2006 after she endured a stroke in Pennsylvania. It happened during surgery to remove a benign tumor near her heart. Still, Dercole admits, she added Dr. Whartons idea to her bucket list. Next week, Dercole will happily cross that degree off her list during a graduation ceremony at Schenectady County Community College, where she has kept herself busy since last year studying thefield of human services. Dercole had transferredcredits from previous college work, and mostly commuted to and from Schenectady by bus. And she plans to pursue furtheracademic studies as well. Dercoles other celebratory destination next Thursday will be the grand opening on High Rock Avenue of the Healing Springs Recovery and Community Outreach Center, which will … Continue reading →

The coroner said Miriam Mertens (right) treatment at Lismore base hospital was monumentally disgraceful. Photograph: Corina Merten Appalling footage of a mentally ill woman stumbling around a NSW hospital, covered in faeces and falling over at least 25 times before she died of a brain injury, has shocked the public and politicians. Footage released by the coroner shows the woman, mother-of-two Miriam Merten, locked in a seclusion room for more than five hours at the Lismore Adult Mental Health Inpatient Unit on 1 June 2014. A nurse unlocks Mertens room the next morning, before she is left to stumble around the hallway naked, eventually collapsing in a corner before an emergency crash cart is rushed in by staff. Merten died at Lismore base hospital on 3 June 2014. A coronial inquest found she died of traumatic and hypoxic brain injury caused by numerous falls and the self-beating of her head on various surfaces, the latter not done with the intention of taking her own life. A senior nurse at the facility was aware Merten had been sedated with psychotropic drugs and fallen on at least one occasion, but failed to take appropriate action, the coroner Jeff Linden found. A second … Continue reading →

U.S. Sen. Edward J. Markey is calling on the head of the Veterans Administration to probe the Boston VA and how it handles brain injury claims, citing a Herald special report that highlighted alarming error rates and a local Marine whose brain mass was overlooked by agency doctors. In a letter delivered yesterday to U.S. Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin, Markey demands action and calls the implications of the Herald report on vets with traumatic brain injuries (TBI) troubling. I call on you to ensure that the VA ... launches a comprehensive investigation of how those working within the Boston Veterans Affairs Regional Office diagnose, treat, and process claims arising out of TBI or other health conditions related to the brain health of veterans, Markey wrote to Shulkin. The Herald reported last week that the VAs inspector general delivered scathing reports of the Boston VAs handling of traumatic brain injury claims in 2011 and 2015, and is working on another review to be issued next year. The 2015 inspection found an unacceptable error rate in assessing the degree of disability in traumatic brain injury (TBI) claims one in six of the cases reviewed that year. This was despite a … Continue reading →