Question:
my spouse is brain injured and blind and we were referred to this guy by the Brain link on internet.. and now he has really MESSED up our case.. probably dont even have a chance for recovery is what other attorneys are saying.. THIS GUY has had the case since 9/98 and filed it .. and NOW tells us.. OH... we dont have an expert and we must withdrawal from representing you !! now we have no lawyer , our case is pending and noone will help us.. !!

this jerk has done harm to the disabled. !! what can one do ? my spouse and i both are disabled.!! i want to report him.. He also dismissed the Hospital from the lawsuit, and we have no recovery from them either !! this was and is a med-mal-practice case.

Answer: The problem with peer review acceptance of brain mapping is it is the neurologists who are the ones who have so much trouble accepting this technology. As too many of us have learned the hard way, neurologists seem to have trouble accepting the entire field of non-coma permanent brain injuries.

Bruce Stern, who is an outstanding brain injury attorney from New Jersey (who lurks but not post here, because of technical problems) has published an excellent article on this issue and I hope he gets his technical problems corrected so that he is able to post to all of his on this topic. If not, I will forward back to the list his comments.

From a trial lawyer standpoint, brain mapping is very intriguing, because it is so demonstrative for the jury, meaning that it is such a useful way to demonstrate (show) what is not working properly in the brain. But until it gets better acceptance, it is a risky proposition for a trial lawyer to invest money in the testing, if the admissability of the tests are questionable.

In my opinion, brain mapping is a potentially valuable diagnostic method that is, at present, still in experimental stages. I have not seen sufficient peer-reviewed studies published in the scientific literature to convince me of the clinical relevance of abnormalities that may be seen. The final word is not out, and I hope that it will be an important advance. However, I do not base my clinical decisions regarding treatment on this test. I still believe that the most important information is from a thorough neuropsychological evaluation (by a well-trained competent neuropsychologist) and a complete history of the injury and subsequent symptoms. Regarding your second questions re: serotonin levels: There is no clinical use of these levels, and it can't be used to diagnose or predect response/non-response to treatment.