Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert A. McDonald Donating His Brain For Research

VA Secretary Joins Others in Pledge to Donate their Brains to VA-lead TBI Research Program

April 20, 2016

 VA Secretary Joins Others in Pledge to Donate their Brains to VA-lead TBI Research Program

 WASHINGTON - Today the Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert A. McDonald announced that he, along with three-time Olympic gold medalist swimmer Nancy Hogshead-Makar and former NFL player and Super Bowl champion Phil Villapiano, have pledged to donate their brains to advance brain research ‎conducted by VA in partnership with the Concussion Legacy Foundation.

The announcement was made at the VA-hosted Brain Trust: Pathways to InnoVAtion, a public-private partner event which builds on the trailblazing efforts of a number of distinguished VA brain researchers and brings together many of the most influential voices in the field of brain health to identify and advance solutions for mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

“As I listened to the very powerful personal stories from Veterans and the challenges the world’s top researchers are working to overcome in TBI, I made a decision: I decided to join the hundreds of Veterans and athletes who have already donated their brain to the VA Brain Bank so that I may, in a small way, contribute to the vital research happening to better understand brain trauma,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert A. McDonald. “This is a very, very serious issue, one that affects Veterans and non-Veterans alike. We don’t know nearly as much as we should about brain health, but if there’s one thing I’ve seen after visiting almost 300 VA facilities in the past two years: our Veterans, particularly those who served in Iraq and Afghanistan are greatly affected by TBI. VA needs to continue leading the coalition of scientists working to improve their lives.

“Building more and stronger strategic partnerships is one of the five strategies of the MyVA transformation. Today, we witnessed a room full of the world’s leading experts coming together under the convening authority of VA to solve one of our most significant challenges, particularly among our younger Veterans. I’m proud to do my part because I know that the researchers at VA are committed to improving lives and they have my full support.”

“Concussions were ignored for a long time and viewed largely as an invisible injury but chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is something we can see and something we can understand. It reveals that brain trauma can have long-term and devastating consequences,” said Chris Nowinski, former WWE wrester and co-founder and president of the Concussion Legacy Foundation which leads outreach and recruiting‎ for the VA-BU-CLF Brain Bank. “The Concussion Legacy Foundation is working to create a culture of brain donation in America by asking living athletes and Veterans to donate their brains to the Brain Bank to be researched by VA and Boston University researchers. It’s a perfect partnership because the most common victims of CTE are athletes and Veterans and by researching both as a part of one program, the sports community and Veteran community can work together to solve this problem. We all need to work together to solve the concussion crisis.”

The VA-BU-CLF Brain Bank is directed by VA’s own Dr. Ann McKee and is located at the Bedford VA Medical Center. It is now the largest sports mTBI and CTE repository in the world with over 325 brains donated, and over a thousand more pledged.

“The research on CTE all started with VA; it began with a VA patient who was a well-known boxer and from that first case of CTE, it has morphed into a tremendous research effort involving NIH, DoD and many other organizations,” said Dr. Ann McKee. “This is not a problem we can solve in any one lab. It’s going to take medical researchers and scientists working with business to detect where it first starts – on the battlefield and sports field. We will need health assessments going into the future for many years. That will take innovation and real input from industry to stimulate this research. That’s why we need a collective effort and his group of leaders is so important. I’m proud to be here encouraging us all to work together to better care for America’s Veterans and patients.”

Brain Trust: Pathways to InnoVAtion is a two-day public-private partnership event hosted by VA. As the largest, integrated health care system in the country, VA is using its convening authority to bring together many of the most influential voices in the field of brain health – to include the Department of Defense, the sports industry, private sector, federal government, Veterans and community partners - to identify and advance solutions for mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). 

Issues related to brain health and head trauma transcend the Veteran and military community, impacting all Americans. By highlighting the themes of collaborative research, medical technology, and sports innovation for player safety, Brain Trust participants are discussing the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, rehabilitation and reintegration of Veterans, athletes, and Americans in general - suffering from head trauma related injuries. The event will also serve as a showcase for many of the advancements that VA is pioneering to improve brain health for Veterans, the military and for the American public at large.  

In addition to many of the world’s most accomplished brain research scientists, Brain Trust attendees include sports commentator Bob Costas, Gen. Peter Chiarelli (CEO of One Mind, and the former Vice Chief of Staff of the Army), Briana Scurry (former U.S. Women’s Soccer Player), Jeanne Marie Laskas (author of the GQ article that inspired the movie “Concussion”), Terry O’Neil (16-time Emmy award winner), representatives from the NFL Players Association, the NFL, the NCAA, DARPA, DOD, NIH, CDC, and many more.

For more information on donating to the VA-BU-CLF Brain Bank or to get involved, go to:http://concussionfoundation.org/get-involved/research

For more information on VA’s work on TBI, go to: http://www.polytrauma.va.gov/understanding-tbi/

Still Missing Veteran Alert Michigan

Michigan family seeks help in search for missing Marine vet
Marine Corps Times 
Matthew L. Schehl 
April 19, 2016

Geoffrey Michael Bowen was last seen by his wife on March 31 at his home in Brooklyn, Michigan. (Photo: Courtesy Kenneth Bowen)

Police and family are urgently asking for help locating a Marine vet missing for two weeks.

On April 1, the sheriff’s office in Jackson County, Michigan, issued a missing person alert for Geoffrey Michael Bowen, who was last seen by his wife on March 31 at his home in Brooklyn, Michigan.

“[Bowen] is 5 feet 10 inches, 175 pounds with short brown hair and a short brown beard,” police said in the alert. “He was last seen driving a 1989 Ford Bronco dark blue in color with white stripes. It has a Michigan Marine veteran license plate with the registration of OLCC7.”

Bowen joined the Marines as a rifleman in December 2005. He deployed to Iraq twice — once in 2007 and again in 2008. He left the service as a corporal in December 2009, according to Marine Corps officials. His brother said he served with 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines.
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Welcome Home Last Patrol Remembrance From Rolling Thunder

‘Welcome Home’ event aimed at saluting Vietnam veterans
Tampa Tribune
Linda Chion Kenney
Special Correspondent
April 20, 2016

“We don’t make the policies,” he said. “We don’t make those decisions. We follow the orders we’re given. We perform our duties. We perform our duties and serve with honor.”
U.S. Navy commander and Vietnam veteran Bradley E. Smith Ex-POW

After “The Last Patrol” performance by Rolling Thunder, members, from left, Mike Vitel, Doc Watson and Bill Marion pose by a Vietnam-era helicopter at the Vietnam Memorial at Hillsborough County’s Veterans Memorial Park. LINDA CHION KENNEY

TAMPA — Soldiers seasoned and battle-scarred, and the people who support them, stood in solidarity and solemnity March 26 at Veterans Memorial Park, where “welcome home” was the order of the day for the men and women called to service in the Vietnam War era.

In her very personal remarks, chaplain Linda J. Pugsley, a retired lieutenant colonel, who volunteered for two tours of duty in Vietnam as an aeromedical evacuation nurse, recounted the “soaking, soaking rains” and the “scorching, scorching heat” of Vietnam.

“We are valiant people who served with unswerving bravery in that hostile, unfriendly, ungodly Vietnam,” said Pugsley, who in 1978 resigned her position as flight nurse with the rank of major, to pursue her career in the ministry. “We served our country and our fellow warriors in that most brutal and unwise war. Some of us saw mayhem that none of us should have seen, yet we did not run.”

Vietnam veterans are heroes, she added, deserving of appreciation for “what they did and all that they gave up.”
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Georgia Aims Paint Brush After Two Tours in Iraq

How art therapy helps a Georgia veteran with PTSD
Atlanta Magazine
Frank Reddy
April 20, 2016

“[My art] gives me somewhere to put energy

that I have no other way to get rid of.”

Jason Smith works in his home studio.

PHOTOGRAPH BY STEVEN KARL METZER

Everywhere Jason Smith turned, it seemed death surrounded him. As a medic in the smoldering battlegrounds of Iraq, he performed CPR on fatally wounded Marines. Back home he was involved in a car wreck that left him with a traumatic brain injury and killed a friend.

Before long he began hallucinating. There were daytime visions of dying men at his feet. In the grocery store, Smith saw the smiling ghosts of uniformed Marines waving. He was diagnosed in May 2005 with post-traumatic stress disorder.

The following year Smith, 33, was discharged after two tours in Iraq. Back in civilian life, he held and lost eight different jobs, largely due to symptoms relating to his PTSD. After a period of hardship and heavy drinking, Smith finally found comfort doing something he’d never done before: picking up a paintbrush.

These days the walls of the Gainesville, Georgia, home he shares with his wife, Pamela, are decorated with paintings and mixed-media artwork incorporating found items like feathers, vinyl records, and gnarly chunks of driftwood. Pop culture is a dominant theme—think ThunderCats cartoons, Iron Maiden album covers, and Duke’s Mayonnaise jars—but it’s not all lighthearted. One painting features a man dangling from a cliff; a group of soldiers grasp at him from below, trying to pull him down. “The chasm represents PTSD and memories and intrusive thoughts,” says the burley, bearded Smith, who swears by the healing power of the creative process.
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Veteran Lost Job Over PTSD Service Dog!

UPDATE: Veteran "terminated" after fight to take service dog to work
Veteran says ready to file discrimination charges
NBC 26 News
Billy Wagness
Apr 18, 2016

"They're saying they're not getting the proper paperwork, but the paperwork that they're asking [for has] Borderline HIPAA violations," adds Kettner, "and the VA will not fill it out."

A marine veteran living with PTSD has been fighting for months to bring his service dog to work with him.

Now, as the legal battle continues, Shaun Kettner says he has been "terminated" from his employment at L and S Electric.

For Kettner, the Dutch shepherd named 'Sig' has been a lifesaver, helping him focus in daily life when the stress becomes too great.

"You have to look at him as like a wheelchair," says Kettner, as Sig sits quietly next to him.

But the fight to bring the service dog to work has been caught up for weeks in its own legal battle between L and S Electric and the VA.

Representatives for the Appleton-based manufacturing and motor repair company say Kettner had failed to complete proper paperwork for bringing in Sig to work. But Kettner says the VA has so far refused to sign the paperwork in question over concern that some questions asked violated HIPAA laws.
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