Next month (March) is Brain Injury Awareness Month, which aims to increase public perception of brain injury as a chronic condition and reduce the stigma associated with the neurological disorder. One in every 60 people live with a permanent brain injury-related disability in the United States. According to the Brain Injury Association of America, that’s more than 5.3 million children and adults. 

What is a TBI?

Traumatic brain injury (TBI), also called craniocerebral trauma, is defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a disruption in the normal function of the brain that can result from a blow or jolt to the head. TBI is caused by outside force such as a severe car accident or sports injury, resulting in immediate or delayed symptoms of confusion, blurred vision, difficulty concentrating, sleeplessness, and more. TBI can lead to long-term cognitive and behavioral problems and other health conditions. The CDC reports that as many as 150 Americans die from TBI-related injuries each day and that everyone is considered at-risk. 

Long-term symptoms of repeated mild traumatic brain injury, also known as chronic concussion, are difficult to treat. These can occur long after the concussive event and include depression, anxiety, headaches, and fatigue, and, in some cases, seizures. But recent research published in  Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, offers hope to those with chronic concussion. The meta-analysis was the first of its kind to show the potential benefits of yoga, meditation and mindfulness-based interventions for treating symptoms of chronic concussion. 

Lead researcher Rebecca Acabchuk, PhD, a yoga teacher for 17 years and adjunct professor of psychology at the University of Connecticut, utilized her background in competitive sports combined with her passion for yoga and personal connection to chronic concussion to inform her research. “Many athletes who play contact or adventure sports have experienced concussions—including myself, my mom, and two of my daughters,” Acabchuk says. “ I appreciate the athlete mentality, the willingness to take risks and push oneself physically and mentally.” 

Acabchuk says she was working toward her PhD in physiology and neurobiology during the mid-2010’s as concussion awareness was emerging in the mainstream. She was studying the structural changes that occur in the brain from Alzheimer’s disease, and was struck by the parallels that were also occurring in the brains of football players who were half the age of Alzheimer’s patients. This observation was the impetus for Acabchuk to examine the changes in the brain that occur from concussion.

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