The Language and Imagery of Coma and Brain Injury

The Language and Imagery of Coma and Brain Injury
Author: Matthew Colbeck
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2021-04-22
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1350077801

What occurs within coma? What does the coma patient experience? How does the patient perceive the world outside of coma, if at all? The simple answer to these questions is that we don't know. Yet the sheer volume of literary and media texts would have us believe that we do. Examining representations of coma and brain injury across a variety of texts, this book investigates common tropes and linguistic devices used to portray the medical condition of coma, giving rise to universal mythologies and misconceptions in the public domain. Matthew Colbeck looks at how these texts represent, or fail to represent, long-term brain injury, drawing on narratives of coma survivors that have been produced and curated through writing groups he has run over the last 10 years. Discussing a diverse range of cultural works, including novels by Irvine Welsh, Stephen King, Tom McCarthy and Douglas Coupland, as well as film and media texts such as The Sopranos, Kill Bill, Coma and The Walking Dead, Colbeck provides an explanation for our fascination with coma. With a proliferation of misleading stories of survival in the media and in literature, this book explores the potential impact these have upon our own understanding of coma and its victims.

Evaluation of the Disability Determination Process for Traumatic Brain Injury in Veterans

Evaluation of the Disability Determination Process for Traumatic Brain Injury in Veterans
Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 211
Release: 2019-05-20
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0309486890

The Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) provides disability compensation to veterans with a service-connected injury, and to receive disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), a veteran must submit a claim or have a claim submitted on his or her behalf. Evaluation of the Disability Determination Process for Traumatic Brain Injury in Veterans reviews the process by which the VA assesses impairments resulting from traumatic brain injury for purposes of awarding disability compensation. This report also provides recommendations for legislative or administrative action for improving the adjudication of veterans' claims seeking entitlement to compensation for all impairments arising from a traumatic brain injury.

Traumatic Brain Injury

Traumatic Brain Injury
Author: Connie Goldsmith
Publisher: Twenty-First Century Books
Total Pages: 92
Release: 2014-01-01
Genre: Young Adult Nonfiction
ISBN: 1467725501

Two soccer players collide on the field. A soldier in Afghanistan is thrown to the ground during a bomb explosion. A teen has an accident while riding her bike—and she isn't wearing her helmet. Each of these incidents can produce a traumatic brain injury (TBI). Of the 1.7 million Americans officially diagnosed with TBI each year, 52,000 die from their injuries. And that doesn't count all the unreported TBIs, which experts estimate range from about two to four million more incidents. TBIs range from concussions to penetrating head injuries to life-threatening brain swelling and coma. And they have countless causes: war, sports, car and motorcycle accidents, falls, and physical violence. The aftereffects can be devastating, including compromised memory and concentration, loss of hearing, physical disabilities, depression, brain disorders, and, in the worst-case scenario, death. Find out about the different types of TBIs, what causes them, and how they are diagnosed and treated. Along the way, you'll learn about National Hockey League player Derek Boogaard and U.S. Representative Gabby Giffords, both of whom sustained TBIs, with dramatically different outcomes. You'll also meet teens and young adults living with TBIs and the doctors who treat them. And you'll learn about amazing medical technologies that help victims recover and promise hope for the future.

The Comatose Patient

The Comatose Patient
Author: Eelco F.M. Wijdicks
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 809
Release: 2014-04-28
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0199331235

The Comatose Patient, Second Edition, is a critical historical overview of the concepts of consciousness and unconsciousness, covering all aspects of coma within 100 detailed case vignettes. This comprehensive text includes principles of neurologic examination of comatose patients as well as instruction of the FOUR Score coma scale, and also discusses landmark legal cases and ethical problems. As the Chair of Division of Critical Care Neurology at Mayo Clinic, Dr. Wijdicks uses his extensive knowledge to discuss a new practical multistep approach to the diagnosis of the comatose patient. Additionally, this edition includes extensive coverage of the interpretation of neuroimaging and its role in daily practice and decision making, as well as management in the emergency room and ICU. Dr. Wijdicks details long-term supportive care and an appropriate approach to communication with family members about end-of-life decision making. In addition, video clips on neurologic examination and neurologic manifestations seen in comatose patients can be found here: http://oxfordmedicine.com/comatosepatient2e. All video recordings from the first edition have been reformatted and remastered for optimal use, and several more video clips of patients have also been included.

The Language and Imagery of Coma and Brain Injury

The Language and Imagery of Coma and Brain Injury
Author: Matthew Colbeck
Publisher:
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2021
Genre: Brain
ISBN: 9781350077829

Introduction -- 1. Contextualising coma: a medical and cultural history -- 2. Coma, memory and the exilic self -- 3. Coma and the Katabatic archetype -- 4. Selfhood and the post-coma condition -- 5. Coma, brain injury and lived experience -- 6. Coma as metaphor.

Clinical Neurophysiology in Disorders of Consciousness

Clinical Neurophysiology in Disorders of Consciousness
Author: Andrea O. Rossetti
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 161
Release: 2015-02-13
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 3709116341

Over the past two decades, electrophysiology has undergone unprecedented changes thanks to technical improvements, which simplify measurement and analysis and allow more compact data storage. This book covers in detail the spectrum of electrophysiology applications in patients with disorders of consciousness. Its content spans from clinical aspects of the management of subjects in the intensive care unit, including EEG, evoked potentials and related implications in terms of prognosis and patient management to research applications in subjects with ongoing consciousness impairment. While the first section provides up-to-date information for the interested clinician, the second part highlights the latest developments in this exciting field. The book comprehensively combines clinical and research information related to neurophysiology in disorder-of- consciousness patients, making it an easily accessible reference for neuro-ICU specialists, epileptologists and clinical neurophysiologists as well as researchers utilizing EEG and event-related potentials.

Plum and Posner's Diagnosis and Treatment of Stupor and Coma

Plum and Posner's Diagnosis and Treatment of Stupor and Coma
Author: Jerome B. Posner
Publisher:
Total Pages: 521
Release: 2019
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0190208872

Plum and Posner's Diagnosis and Treatment of Stupor and Coma, 5th edition provides a comprehensive overview of the theory behind regulation of consciousness in humans, the mechanisms of loss of consciousness clinically, and the examination and diagnosis of the cause of loss of consciousness in patients. New sections provide the latest information on the treatment of comatose patients, brain death, recovery from structural coma, and the ethics of dealing with comatose patients.

Traumatic Brain and Spinal Cord Injury

Traumatic Brain and Spinal Cord Injury
Author: Cristina Morganti-Kossmann
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 361
Release: 2012-07-19
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1107007437

Presents the most up-to-date clinical and experimental research in neurotrauma in an illustrated, accessible, comprehensive volume.

The Social Construction of Death

The Social Construction of Death
Author: Leen Van Brussel
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2014-07-31
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 113739191X

Chapter 12 of this book is open access under a CC BY license. Well-established scholars from a variety of disciplines - including sociology, anthropology, media and cultural studies, and political sciences – use the social construction of death and dying to analyse a wide variety of meaning-making practices in societal fields such as ethics, politics, media, medicine and family.