Looking ahead to health promotion

At this stage, I would say my knowledge of brain injury as a health promotion topic, particularly in underserved communities is vast. I have been working in brain injury for over a decade, and personally, my husband suffered a moderate brain injury in 2014. We had to navigate the fragmented system ourselves, learning just how disjointed and overwhelming it can be.

Brain injury is a global public health concern due to its high prevalence and the profound, long-lasting impacts it has on individuals, families, and society. In Canada, approximately 165,000 people experience a traumatic brain injury (TBI) each year—that’s about 456 cases daily, or one every three minutes (Brain Injury Canada, 2023).TBI is the leading cause of death in the first half of life and a significant cause of chronic disability across all age groups in Canada (Hutchison et al.). With this data and recognizing the impact of brain injury, there is no national strategy to guide research, implement best practices, or standardize care pathways (Hutchison et al.). Access to brain injury-specific care remains limited, especially for individuals with complex needs, such as those with co-occurring mental health or substance use challenges or those living in rural and remote communities.

Services are concentrated in larger urban centers, leaving smaller communities with significant gaps. The current system is marked by fragmented care, non-standardized referral pathways, and a lack of clear discharge guidelines, all creating barriers for individuals attempting to access the support they need to recover and reintegrate into their communities. To address the issue, my health promotion plan will focus on improving access to brain injury care for underserved communities and marginalized populations.

My personal learning goal is to learn how to turn ideas into action. I want to learn how to develop policies that bring multiple sectors together to influence and enhance access to care for individuals with brain injuries. I am also excited to learn about other successful service hubs in other health populations and explore how to apply that to BI care.

That being said, this health promotion topic has the ability to snowball out of control as it’s a large complex issue spanning across many sectors like health, housing, justice, community, and municipalities. I may need to narrow the focus to either service hubs, referral pathways, or provider education.

References

Brain Injury Canada. “Statistics on Brain Injury.” Brain Injury Canada, 15 Oct. 2020, braininjurycanada.ca/en/statistics/.

Hutchison, James S., et al. “The Canadian Traumatic Brain Injury Research Consortium: Epitomizing Collaborative Research in Canada.” Journal of Neurotrauma, vol. 35, no. 16, 15 Aug. 2018, pp. 1858–1863, https://doi.org/10.1089/neu.2018.5871. Accessed 15 Jan. 2019.