New Hope for Brain Injury Victims

Traumatic brain injury, also known as TBI, occurs when brain cells are damaged by a blow or other violent force to the head. TBI is a potentially serious condition that can have lifelong effects. In Michigan, about 30 percent of TBIs are caused by car accidents. The other major cause of TBI is falling. A new study now shows that some TBI sufferers can benefit from treatment with a drug originally used to treat flu.
TBI Statistics
According to the Associated Press, across the country, TBI happens to about 1.7 million people a year, resulting in about 52,000 deaths. More than 250,000 people are hospitalized due to TBI.
Study Analyzes New Use for Flu Drug
Some medical discoveries occur unintentionally, as is the case with a potential new use for an old drug designed to treat influenza. The drug, amantadine, was approved in the 1960s as a flu treatment. Doctors observed that, when the drug was given to nursing home patients who had Parkinson’s disease, the Parkinson’s symptoms improved. Amantadine apparently affects a brain system that controls alertness and movement, and it became an approved treatment for Parkinson’s.
The use of amantadine soon extended to TBI patients, but until the recent study there was no definitive proof that it helped them. In the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, 184 patients with severe TBI received either amantadine or a placebo daily over a four-week period. All the patients had been hurt one to four months before the study began. All were no better than minimally conscious, and a third were in a vegetative state, waking occasionally but usually unconscious.
Drug May Help TBI Recovery
Doctors say that TBI victims usually improve on their own within a one- to four-month window after injury. In the study, the participants did improve somewhat, even with the dummy drug, but those who received amantadine got better faster. When the researchers stopped administering the drug, within two weeks the two groups were at the same level; without the drug, recovery in the amantadine group slowed down. The study showed definitively that amantadine was responsible for the faster rate of improvement.
Although the advances shown with amantadine are promising, TBI recovery can be long and may never be complete. If a person’s injury is due to someone’s negligence, a personal injury attorney with experience in brain injury cases can help victims and their families seek compensation, including payment for medical expenses, lost wages and pain and suffering.