USA — Center Offers Hope to Heal War’s ‘Invisible Wounds’

WASHINGTON — The 72,000-square-foot Nation­al Intre­pid Cen­ter of Excel­lence opened here today with the promise of being a world leader in the research, diag­no­sis and treat­ment plan­ning for the sig­na­ture brain injuries and psy­cho­log­i­cal con­di­tions of wound­ed war­riors.

The $65 mil­lion cen­ter, built by pri­vate dona­tions to the Intre­pid Fall­en Heroes Fund on the grounds of the Nation­al Naval Med­ical Cen­ter, will use “extra­or­di­nar­i­ly new and com­pre­hen­sive approach­es” to pro­vide the next gen­er­a­tion of care to ser­vice­mem­bers and their fam­i­lies, Dr. Thomas DeGra­ba, the center’s deputy direc­tor, told reporters at a media event yesterday. 

“This is tru­ly an out­stand­ing gift that will be a trea­sure for the Amer­i­can peo­ple … and the world at large,” DeGra­ba said. “This cen­ter is an instru­ment of hope, heal­ing, dis­cov­ery and learning.” 

The cen­ter is one of six cre­at­ed under the Defense Cen­ters of Excel­lence for Psy­cho­log­i­cal Health and Trau­mat­ic Brain Injury, estab­lished in 2007 to lead Defense Depart­ment work on brain sci­ence and treat­ment in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Vet­er­ans Affairs Depart­ment, as well as aca­d­e­m­ic and oth­er institutions. 

Navy Rear Adm. Matthew L. Nathan, com­man­der of the Nation­al Naval Med­ical Cen­ter, said that insti­tu­tion, the Intre­pid Cen­ter, and Wal­ter Reed Army Med­ical Cen­ter, will col­lab­o­rate in the research and diag­no­sis of brain injuries, includ­ing the elu­sive mild TBI, and psy­cho­log­i­cal prob­lems, and cre­ate indi­vid­ual treat­ment plans for ser­vice­mem­bers, with close inter­ac­tion with families. 

The Intre­pid Cen­ter is not a treat­ment facil­i­ty, DeGra­ba said, but instead will take patients who are referred from mil­i­tary facil­i­ties that can’t help them. They and their fam­i­lies, he said, are then sent to the Intre­pid Cen­ter for about two weeks dur­ing which time they are eval­u­at­ed by the center’s array of health pro­fes­sion­als, includ­ing neu­rol­o­gists, radi­ol­o­gists, psy­chol­o­gists, phys­i­cal and occu­pa­tion­al ther­a­pists who will con­sid­er com­bi­na­tions of clin­i­cal and alter­na­tive remedies. 

The Intre­pid team will work to pro­vide a diag­no­sis and treat­ment plan that the ser­vice­mem­ber can return home with, DeGra­ba said. The center’s concierge and con­ti­nu­ity ser­vice com­prised of nurs­es and social work­ers will work close­ly with fam­i­lies to ensure they under­stand and sup­port their ser­vice­mem­ber through treat­ment, he said. 

“We plan on some very nov­el and unique plans for treat­ment,” and will coor­di­nate with med­ical providers at the servicemember’s home base to ensure long-term con­ti­nu­ity of care, Army Col. George Nuss­baum, deputy direc­tor of the center’s clin­i­cal and research sup­port, said. 

The cen­ter has capac­i­ty for 520 ser­vice­mem­bers and their fam­i­lies, and the Fish­er House Foun­da­tion, will build an addi­tion­al house, to add to two oth­ers it has on the med­ical cen­ter grounds, for giv­ing fam­i­lies of wound­ed war­riors a home away from home. 

“Our capac­i­ty is lim­it­less,” DeGra­ba said, not­ing the cen­ter is a research-shar­ing insti­tu­tion with reach around the world. Offi­cials there also plan to use the “tele­health” resources of Inter­net and tele­vi­sion for bet­ter out­reach, he said. 

Nathan said the Intre­pid cen­ter will pro­vide the best com­bi­na­tion of art and sci­ence to diag­nose and treat patients. It includes $10 mil­lion worth of the lat­est equip­ment to assess patients for diag­no­sis and treat­ment that includes the abil­i­ty to view as many as 6,000 images inside the brain from one MRI, where­as most imag­ing equip­ment only shows the out­side of the brain. And, vir­tu­al real­i­ty equip­ment is employed to assess a patient’s motor and cog­ni­tive skills, among others. 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs) 

Team GlobDef

Seit 2001 ist GlobalDefence.net im Internet unterwegs, um mit eigenen Analysen, interessanten Kooperationen und umfassenden Informationen für einen spannenden Überblick der Weltlage zu sorgen. GlobalDefence.net war dabei die erste deutschsprachige Internetseite, die mit dem Schwerpunkt Sicherheitspolitik außerhalb von Hochschulen oder Instituten aufgetreten ist.

Alle Beiträge ansehen von Team GlobDef →