Question:
My questions: the main one is whether anyone out there knows of any way I could get in touch with a sypathetic doctor in the Bay Area. (I have Blue Cross insurance, if that's relevant.) I would like to have an official diagnosis, and I am sure it would be really helpful if I end up having to take more time off. Not to mention that I am scared and confused and would like an authority figure to tell me that I'm not making it up, and that the recovery outlook is decent.

Answer: I practiced and observed my clients and in their recovery I became convinced that the engram theory has alot of validity. Engrams are more impressions or traces in the cortex than identified pathways. The analogy comes to mind of gentle rain falling on a hillside. If enough rain falls on the same hillside an impression will be created in the hillside. The same with the brain, if the same skill is accessed or required to function enough times then a trace or impression remains in the cortex and that skill is refreshed or renewed. Yes, this is a part of cognitive rehabilitation. Repetition is one of our most important approaches. If we as therapists can create a plan that accesses the same skill through a variety of different avenues then that skill is restrengthened to a functioning level. This takes a great deal of creativity and consistent reassessing of each clients strengths and weaknesses, assisting each one to use their "splinter" skills to support and renew the skills that have been diminished by the injury. I look as the brain much like a muscle. Many of us work out or run or bicycle to strengthen our muscles. If there is a weakened part of the brain, we can exercise that part by requiring it to use skills housed in that part of the brain, thereby strengthening that part. It may be hard, even painful at first, just as a weak muscle may be sore when first exercised. It is truly worth the effort in the end though.

My outlook about brain injury recovery is that an individual will continue to grow, learn and develop the rest of their lives, just as someone who has not sustained an injury continues to grow, learn and develop the rest of their lives as long as they seek out stimulation and have a zest for, and interest in, life and what is going on around them. The only difference in an injured person and a noninjured person is that the injured individual has to start a little farther down the track of life and work forward from that point rather than moving forward from the point where they were before their accident. It has been demonstrated through recent research that we can cause the dendrites in our brains to sprout additional branches by providing the appropriate stimulation and keeping mentally active. Dendrites are tree-like, branching, protoplasmic processes that act as conductors for the electrical impulses from one neuronal cell in the brain to another. These impulses are called synapses. The more branching of dendrites we have the greater number of electrical impulses are conducted between neurons and the richer brain activity occurs.