Some basic facts about traumatic brain injury
In its simplest terms, a traumatic brain injury is condition caused by a head injury that results in lasting damage to the brain. It can be a closed-head injury or one that pierces the skull and penetrates the brain. Conditions such as stroke and brain tumors are not, technically speaking, a TBI, although they may cause the same kinds of damage.

Each year, an average of 1.4 million Americans suffer a traumatic brain injury—that’s one every 23 seconds. About 5 million of these survivors live with a disability because of the TBI.

Anything that causes trauma to the brain can cause a TBI. The list of causes includes falls; motor vehicle, bicycle, or vehicle-pedestrian accidents; sports; street violence; domestic abuse (including shaken baby syndrome); and, as we have become aware in recent years, exposure to blasts during war. Half of all TBIs involve alcohol use.

Blast injuries to the brain resulting from exposure to explosions have become common in the wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan. Even without visible wounds, military personnel close to a blast can suffer brain damage due to the intense changes in air pressure caused by the blast. As of January 2009, according to the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America,between 10 and 20 percent of Iraq veterans, or 150,000 and 300,000 service members, have some level of TBI.

Websites
This is only a sampling of websites devoted to brain injury. If you would like to see others, simply search online for “traumatic brain injury” or “TBI.”

Brain Injury Association of America (See “State Offices” on this site also)
http://www.biausa.org

BrainLine
http://brainline.org

TBI Resource Guide
An excellent section about veterans and TBI: http://www.neuroskills.com/veterans/index.shtml

Brain Trauma Foundation
http://www.braintrauma.org

North American Brain Injury Society
http://www.nabis.org

Books
Living with Brain Injury: A Guide for Families by Richard Senelick, MD, and Karla Dougherty
Coping with Mild Traumatic Brain Injury by Diane Roberts Stoler, Ed.D., and Barbara Albers Hille
Confronting Traumatic Brain Injury: Devastation, Hope, and Healing by William J. Winslade
Successfully Surviving a Brain Injury: A Family Guidebook by Garry Prowe
Realistic Hope: Aspirations for Survivors of Traumatic Brain Injury  by Mark Palmer
In an Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing by Lee and Bob Woodruff
Where is the Mango Princess? by Cathy Crimmins
In the Shadow of Memory by Floyd Skloot
To Love What Is: A Marriage Transformed by Alix Kates Shulman
A Three Dog Life by Abigail Thomas
Gifts from the Broken Jar: Rediscovering Hope, Beauty, and Joy by PJ Long
Over My Head: A Doctor’s Own Story Of Head Injury From the Inside Looking Out by Claudia L. Osborn
Listening in the Silence, Seeing in the Dark: Reconstructing Life After Brain Injury by Ruthann Knechel Johansen
Head Case: Stories of Brain Injury and its Aftermath by Paul Michael Mason