Acquired brain injury (ABI) is damage to the brain that occurs after birth but is not due to an inherited disorder or degenerative disease. Damage may be caused either by a traumatic or non-traumatic injury to the head

What is a Traumatic Brain Injury?

Traumatic brain injury is damage to the brain caused by an external physical force such as a motor vehicle accident, assault or a fall. As a result of the traumatic injury, the brain may be torn, stretched, penetrated, bruised or become swollen, which may affect one or more areas of the brain.

What is Non-Traumatic Brain Injury?

Acquired brain injury (ABI) can also occur as a result of a non-traumatic event such as tumour, infection, aneurysm or anoxia.

Effects of a brain injury

Both forms of brain injury can reduce a person’s state of consciousness, their cognitive (thinking) abilities, or their physical functioning. Injury to the brain may also cause a change in personality or a disturbance to behavioural or emotional functioning.

Typical cognitive (thinking) changes after brain injury can include, but are not limited to:

• Difficulty paying attention
• Easily confused and overwhelmed
• Problems in learning new information
• Reduced memory for new information
• Problem-solving, planning and organising difficulties
• Stuck on ideas and fixed patterns of thinking
• Difficulty starting activities
• Slower at processing information

Typical physical changes after brain injury can include, but are not limited to:

• Headaches
• Changes in smell or taste
• Weakness
• Clumsiness
• Inability to move an arm or leg
• Sensitivity to light and/or noise
• Extensive fat
• Seizures
• Changes in hearing
• Changes in vision
• Difficulty sleeping
  

Typical emotional changes after brain injury can include, but not limited to:

• Sadness and/or grief
• Depression and/or anxiety
• Loss of self-esteem
• Changes in personality, including difficulties in emotional control
• Use of substances such as drugs or alcohol
• Irritability
• "Before/now" comparisons
  

The level of these changes is dependent on a number of factors, including:

• The seriousness or severity of the brain injury
• The location of brain damage
• How well the person has integrated back into the community.
  

For many people who sustain a brain injury these changes may gradually improve. However, at the time of their injury it is impossible to predict how they will recover or how long it will take.

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