U.S. veterans of the Iraqi and Afghani wars are suffering traumatic brain injury (TBI) at an alarming rate. In fact, over 155,000 soldiers have been diagnosed with some form of TBI. TBIs can be devastating for victims and their families. With TBIs affecting civilians and soldiers alike, many Madison County residents have been touched directly or indirectly by this condition.

Presently, these injuries are very difficult to detect. The current testing is expensive and uses very high-tech equipment like CT scanners that are not widely available, especially in theaters of war. The military also relies primarily on the Automated Neuropsychological Assessment Metrics (ANAM) to test troops in uniform, but believe it or not, ANAM has never even been confirmed as a scientifically proven option to diagnose traumatic brain injury.

New technologies in the pipeline promise to have sweeping effects in helping to diagnose TBI for soldiers injured in battle and civilians injured back home. New tests rely on solely on the physical manifestations of the trauma such as hemorrhaging and bloodstream markers. These actual conditions will help detect the condition as it's occurring and before any additional damage can be done waiting for a CT scan.

New brain injury detection tools will eventually benefit civilians in domestic clinics and hospitals as well. In Europe, the InfraScanner has been used for years. It has also been recently approved by the FDA here in the U.S. The InfraScanner is a handheld device that uses light to detect bleeding in the brain. It is light, portable, relatively inexpensive and has a proven track record of catching the physical aspects of traumatic brain injury in real time.

InfraScanners and similar technology allow doctors and physicians on and off the battlefield to catch bleeding in the brain and detect a TBI immediately. These new scanners are a huge advancement from the traditional use of the CT scan.

Similar handheld devices are in the works to be used outside of hospitals and with EMS and are expected to be in use within the next year.

Source: ProPublica, "New Technologies in the Works to Detect Brain Injuries," Lena Groeger, Jan. 5, 2012