The Texas Medical Association Foundation (TMA Foundation) recently awarded neurosurgeon Mark J. Kubala, MD, FAANS(L) their highest honor, the Heart of Gold Award. The foundation presents the award to outstanding individuals who embody a “gold standard” of volunteerism and have made a measurable impact on the foundation’s mission through gifts and leadership. Read More
From time to time on Neurosurgery Blog, you will see us cross-posting or linking to items from other publications that may interest our readers. Today’s post was first published in The Hill on July 6, titled “A new crisis at the border: Traumatic injuries caused by falls from Trump’s 30-foot wall.” In the op-ed, Alexander Tenorio, MD, a neurological surgery resident at the University of California San Diego, discusses the injuries and economic burden of height extensions of U.S.-Mexico border wall barriers.
“As a physician, it is my duty to reveal this unnecessary harm and strain on hospital resources. As the son of Mexican immigrants, it is my duty to continue to fight for this vulnerable population,” states Dr. Tenorio.
Dr. Tenorio recently joined human rights leaders as the physician representative to brief members of Congress and President Biden’s domestic policy advisors on the public health crisis occurring at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Click here to read the op-ed.
Editor’s Note: We hope you will share what you learn from our posts. We invite you to join the conversation on Twitter by following @Neurosurgery and using the hashtag #neurosurgery.
From time to time on Neurosurgery Blog, you will see us cross-posting or linking to items from other places that may interest our readers. Today’s post originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times on April 13, titled “Opinion: As a San Diego neurosurgeon, I see the devastating toll of the raised border wall.” In the op-ed, Alexander Tenorio, MD, a neurological surgery resident at the University of California San Diego, poignantly discusses the horrific spinal cord and brain injuries caused by falls from the border wall.
Dr. Tenorio relays stories of patients coming to the emergency department with serious injuries, such as a 30-year-old male with an unstable spinal fracture after falling off the border wall. The patient had a severe spinal cord injury. Dr. Tenorio “walked over to the trauma unit and saw the terrified young man, lying immobile with a collar supporting his neck. Instead of concerned family, he was surrounded by Border Patrol officers.”
Since the height of the border wall in San Diego was raised in 2019, there have been a record number of traumatic spinal injuries sustained in border falls. Dr. Tenorio can attest to the unnecessary human suffering the higher wall imposes on people. As the son of Mexican immigrants who crossed the same border in the 1980s when fleeing violent threats in their hometown, Dr. Tenorio understands that his patient’s life story could easily have been his or his parents’.
Dr. Tenorio concludes the op-ed urging political leaders to halt the planned border wall extensions and provide greater resources for hospitals serving border regions.
Click here to read the op-ed.
Editor’s Note: We hope you will share what you learn from our posts. We invite you to join the conversation on Twitter by following @Neurosurgery and using the hashtag #neurosurgery.
Figure 1: CDC HEADS UP materials 2003 through present
This March, in recognition of Brain Injury Awareness Month, we want to take a moment to reflect on the momentous progress that has been made related to concussion education over the last 20 years. During that time, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) HEADS UP concussion education initiative started as a small campaign and grew to become an integral part of concussion education. This had a substantial impact on concussion laws and policies nationwide.
In the Children’s Health Act of 2000 (H.R. 4365) (Library of Congress, 1999–2000), Congress charged CDC to develop a public information campaign to broaden public awareness of the health consequences of traumatic brain injury. In response, in 2003, CDC released the HEADS UP: Brain Injury in Your Practice tool kit for health care providers. The goal of the tool kit was to improve awareness among primary care providers about the diagnosis and management of mild traumatic brain injury, an under-diagnosed and under-identified injury. Since then, CDC HEADS UP has become the go-to resource for concussion prevention and education — reaching millions of Americans with concussion information. CDC HEADS UP materials cover how to prevent, recognize and respond to a possible concussion or other serious brain injury. It has grown to include materials for health care providers, coaches, parents, school professionals, sports officials, and kids and teens (Figure 1). Some successes of CDC HEADS UP include:
Educating People and Communities
One of the biggest achievements of CDC HEADS UP has been its ability to support the implementation of Concussion in Sports laws that now exist in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Concussion in sports laws (sometimes referred to as return-to-play laws) was first passed in Washington state in 2009. These laws focus on concussion safety for youth. Most require that coaches and others involved in youth sports receive training on concussion identification and response before the start of the sports season. CDC HEADS UP provides six online training courses designed for coaches, health care providers, school professionals, athletic trainers and sports officials (Figure 2). The availability of these quality training courses (at no cost) allows states, sports programs and schools to comply with education requirements contained in concussion in sports laws and policies. To date, more than 10 million people nationwide have completed at least one of these six training courses.
Figure 2: CDC HEADS UP online training courses on concussion used nationwide to implement state concussion policies and laws
Importantly, CDC HEADS UP educational initiatives and materials align with the best scientific
evidence available on concussion prevention and management. Studies show that CDC HEADS UP materials:
CDC HEADS UP to the Future!
CDC HEADS UP has contributed to a new landscape of concussion awareness in the United States — building, improving and supporting concussion safety around the country. However, the work of the campaign is not yet done. Exciting upcoming CDC HEADS UP initiatives include:
CDC works to put HEADS UP concussion materials into the hands of parents, healthcare and school professionals, coaches, athletes and others. You can support this mission by:
In 2023, we celebrate 20 years of CDC HEADS UP’s contribution to the substantial strides in educating the public about concussion. Together we all can play a part in ensuring that the next generation of children is better protected from concussions and their potentially serious effects.
References:
It’s been five years since the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) released a report titled, “A National Trauma Care System: Integrating Military and Civilian Trauma Systems to Achieve Zero Preventable Deaths After Injury.”
Having led a model for military-civilian collaboration at the Army Trauma Training Center in Miami, Fla., I was invited to be a reviewer of this report. I appreciated the wisdom of focusing on military-civilian trauma collaboration to save more lives from injury — whether on the battlefield or at home.
Such structured collaboration:
With three years of hard work in advocacy, the MISSION ZERO Act was signed into law in 2019 as part of (H.R. 269/S. 1379), the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness and Advancing Innovation Act (P.L. 116-22).
This Act:
However, although the program was created (i.e., authorized), it has yet to be funded (i.e., appropriated). In 2020, the House of Representatives did include funding, but the Senate did not.
Five years later, trauma remains the leading cause of death for children and adults under age 44.
We are working quickly with the new Congress to achieve funding for Fiscal Year (FY) 2022. There is already good news. On April 27, 34 members of the U.S. House of Representatives sent a letter requesting full funding for MISSION ZERO to the House Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Subcommittee leadership. Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Bill Cassidy, MD, (R-La.) are leading a similar effort in the Senate.
May is National Trauma Awareness Month, which is an opportunity for you to take action. So please ask your Senators and Representatives to support full funding at the authorized amount of $11.5 million for MISSION ZERO in the FY 2022 appropriations bills.
Fully funding this critical program will help improve injury care and public health response in our communities, states and nation, inclusive of our military health system.
Editor’s Note: We hope that you will share what you learn from our posts. We invite you to join the conversation on Twitter during National Trauma Awareness Month this May by following @Neurosurgery and @AmCollSurgeons, using the hashtags #TraumaAwarenessMonth and #Trauma.
J
ohn H. Armstrong, MD, FACS, FCCP
Chair, Advocacy Pillar, American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma
Former Florida Surgeon General and Secretary of Health, 2012-16
University of South Florida, Morsani College of Medicine
Tampa, Fla.
From time to time on Neurosurgery Blog, you will see us cross-posting or linking to items from other places when we believe they hit the mark on an issue. We wanted to bring attention to these recommendations compiled by Alexander R. Vaccaro MD, PhD and Gregory D. Schroeder, MD and others at the Cervical Spine Research Society (CSRS) meeting in New York City. This article recently appeared in Neurosurgery, the official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, which publishes research on clinical and experimental neurosurgery covering the very latest developments in science, technology and medicine.
In October of 2020, Neurosurgery published “Updated Return-to-Play Recommendations for Collision Athletes After Cervical Spine Injury: A Modified Delphi Consensus Study With the Cervical Spine Research Society,” which provides consensus statements reached through formal survey methodology on managing football athletes with traumatic neck injuries.
According to a recent Rothman Orthopaedic Institute press release, author Dr. Vaccaro stated, “our study provides the consensus expert opinion of spine surgeons with experience treating neck injuries in collision athletes, especially American football. The topic is controversial, and randomized trials are impractical. Our results deliver updated recommendations from over 100 surgeons, and also highlights persistent areas of controversy.”
To read the full Neurosurgery article, click here.
Editor’s Note: We encourage everyone to join the conversation online by using the hashtag #Spine.
Clemens M. Schirmer, MD, PhD, FAANS, FAHA (right) Vice-Chair, AANS/CNS Communications and Public Relations Committee Geisinger Health System Wilkes Barre, PA Shelly D. Timmons, MD, PhD, FAANS, FACS (left) President…
