Associate Professor Christine Mac Donald’s paper entitled Outcome Trends Following U.S. Military Concussive Traumatic Brain Injury has been honored by the Defense Centers of Excellence as number two on the list of Top 10 Concussion Research Articles of 2016.
Dr. Mac Donald’s article concerns Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression that often accompany combat-related Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). In this study, she and her colleagues looked at 1- year outcomes for service members who sustained a combat-related TBI between 2008 and 2013. After examining possible correlations between PTSD, depression and TBI, they found a trend toward less PTSD in later groups of service members. Overall, however, long-term outcomes for these co-occurring conditions have improved only slightly and are often poor — confirming the importance of early care for PTSD and depression in TBI patients. The overall goal of Dr. Mac Donald’s research is to understand the long term impact of these war-time related injuries to guide new recommendations for clinical management and therapeutic intervention.
Congratulations to Dr. Mac Donald and her team!