Traumatic Brain Injury Patient - Free Essay

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is defined as non-degenerative, and non-congenital damage to the brain primarily caused by an external mechanical force. As a consequence of the insult to the brain, a patient may suffer from permanent or temporary disability of cognitive, psychosocial, and physical functions as well as linked with a weakened or altered state of consciousness. As witnessed from the patient scenario for this task, lack of proper treatment for TBI ends up causing a kaleidoscope of mental health problems hence the need to address better ways of managing this problem (Jumisko, Lexell, & Söderberg, 2005). TBI and post-traumatic stress condition have a possibility of causing midlife problems if not treated on time, especially among the veteran population who are years or decades past their trauma. Therefore, this patient care report will seek to address this condition by providing timely management which will considerably improve the outcome and minimize the mortality levels.

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The Outcomes of Population Health Improvement Initiative

The results of the health improvement initiative have enhanced the development of a safe environment for adults and children; hence reducing the high numbers of head injuries. Individuals who experience severe brain injury such as the veteran soldiers may lack muscle strength, having trouble with their stability or balance due to hypertension, lose vision, hearing, or speech among other effects. These effects occur based on the part of the brain and the severity of brain damage. However, after the formulation of the health improvement inventiveness, people affected by TBI especially the old soldiers have been enrolled to long-term medical and rehabilitative management which has helped many patients to recover fully or the state of their health improved (Rosenbaum, Gordon, Joannou, & Berman, 2018). Institutions such as the Safe Headspace which is a nonprofit organization has been working on improving the outcomes for TBI and PTSO victims. Its major focus is on older patients who are believed to be past their trauma. This has helped patients to improve their ability to process and interpret information as well as enhance mental functions of the affected individuals.

Nevertheless, further information on the positive strategies of reinforcement particularly after getting discharged from the hospital should be recommended. It is essential to pay more attention to the need of boosting the patient’s strengths and capabilities in the community and at home. This will play a significant role in ensuring that the patient has reinforced his or her self-esteem and promote self-reliance as well as speeding up the recovery process. Moreover, knowledge gaps exist in the lack of enough scientific research of helping patients recover fully from brain damage (Jeffs, Beswick, Campbell, Ferris, & Sidani, 2013). In that, the medical institutions and rehabilitation centers have focused more on the concept of cognitive retaining, which holds that minimum brain’s cognitive capacity can be reestablished to a level only allowed by their level of impairment. This is a positive step towards addressing TBI disorder but there is still more room for improvement. Further information and strategies for helping persons who survive TBI should be emphasized since the recovered patients end up with a chronic disability. This denotes that TBI and PTSO will have significant effects on an individual’s life ranging from physical factors, behavioral, cognitive, and vocational issues.

A Strategy for Refining the Outcomes of a Population Health Improvement Initiative

Formulating a health improvement initiative is essential since it will help TBI and PTSO patients to recover from cognitive and emotional challenges associated with their physical state. Once a TBI patient survivor is physically stable, consequent emotional, cognitive, social difficulties, and behavioral are most likely to manifest, posing a challenge in engaging in treatment and daily activities (Rosenbaum et.al., 2018). Therefore, one of the effective approaches to addressing this issue is by conducting a comprehensive neuropsychological treatment method. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is an ideal initiative for addressing all the outcomes of this condition. It is the most preferred and effective therapeutic approach that can play a crucial role in treating both emotional and behavioral disturbances. Multiple treatment modalities have been invented and tested such as surgical/medical, cognitive, or behavioral approaches (Rice, 2013). However, since we are dealing with an impairment that cuts across several disciplines this requires valuation and rehabilitation guided by an interdisciplinary model. It is characterized by a group of professionals in physical medicine and rehabilitation, pathology, psychology or meditation, social work, and interdisciplinary models, among others.

The current TBI treatments involve psychotherapy, cognitive rehabilitation, and pharmacotherapy (Ripley, Driver, Stork, & Maneyapanda, 2019). Nonetheless, the primary challenge that is recorded involves the psychological and emotional difficulties which in most instances are still flouted even after behavioral, physical, and emotional symptoms are addressed. For example, memory exercise for the elderly is particularly a major challenge since most of the methods used such as Sudoku and crossword puzzles have proven not to be effective due to the levels of concentration for the elderly. Notably, psychology is known for its study and practice on the neuropsychological evaluation of TBI patients; thus there is an immense interest in testing, planning, and offering proper psychological interventions. As a consequence, psychology has promoted TBI patient care, especially from a neuropsychological standpoint.

An Approach to Personalizing Patient Care

Patients who have suffered from severe TBI from both military and civilian populations manifest clinical symptoms of differing levels of severity varying from least to profound effects on their daily functioning. In as much as most patients experience a full recovery, there is a section of mild TBI patients who suffer from mental health problems that generally take longer to resolve since it can be experienced many years after TBI treatment (Gritti, 2017). Patients tend to develop persisting symptoms that require personalized patient care. Based on the evidence of the health population especially on microRNA species in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) may depict molecular modifications in neurodegenerative conditions. Consequently, it can be conjectured that at initial preclinical stages of the disorder, PBMC may offer suitable and clinically quantifiable treatments into the brain. This implies that the accessibility of TBI biomarkers may offer potential elements with clinical relevance to prognosis, prevention, and therapy of post-concussive disease.

Moreover, personalized patient care will require that the family members or the relatives of the patient to be equipped with the necessary information during the rehabilitation and discharge phases. This will be essential in improving the services rendered by the family members to the patients suffering from severe TBI and PTSO. For example in the case of the elderly Vietnam fighter who suffered from a kaleidoscope of mental health, personalized care from family members will play an essential part in his recovery process. This involves, exercising his memory, moderate aerobics, medication, and therapy as well as the meditation sessions. Family members’ experience and contentment with the health care services offered both in the hospital and home care is a crucial indicator of the quality of the individualized care given (Jumisko et.al., 2005). In that, active involvement of the family members is the primary aspect of health care quality since they act as the patient’s representative and positively contribute to the role of care and support.

A personalized approach was reached after acknowledging that the family’s experience will play a key role in both the acute and rehabilitation phases since they will be equipped with information about the consequences of the injury and are prepared for the future. Additionally, the patient’s individual health needs will be on safe hands since he or she will be around the people they can trust as well as uphold the culture and family values. This calls for the need to explore family members’ experiences from the stage of inpatient rehabilitation until when the patient is discharged. A multidimensional balance involves the satisfaction of the family members with the experience of health care services after TBI needs to be designed and implemented (Gritti, 2017). This will provide a better understanding of some of the aspects affecting family members who have a TBI recovering patient. As a result of this initiative, health care providers will have the relevant information needed in addressing TBI and PTSO patients hence refining the quality of services in the future.

The Value and Relevance of Evidence Used to Support an Approach to Personalizing Patient Care.

It is significant to develop personalized care approach for patients with TBI and PTSD because after the patient is physically fit, successive emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and social challenges are likely to emerge. This poses a challenge for performing daily activities and treatment hence the need to actively involve family members. Managing these challenges will require extensive involvement of the family and the neuropsychological treatment approach. CBT is based on the hypothesis that cognitions significantly have impacts on the behaviors of the patient diagnosed with TBI and PTSD and this can be quantified and addressed through the creation of awareness (Ripley et.al., 2019). This implies that an individual can acquire behavioral changes through control and acknowledgment of previous cognitions. The utilization of CBT for patients suffering TBI has focused on minimizing anger, anxiety, depression, and PTSD symptoms as well as enhancing well living with promising outcomes.

However, there are knowledge gaps that need to be solved for the effective implementation of this initiative. Adaptations are still required for the TBI health population to enhance intervention efficacy and create room for replication. For instance, if the objective of a multidisciplinary unit is to attain the best possible results, the medical practitioners involved require necessary information on the skills and aims of psychotherapy. On the other hand, psychotherapists are supposed to have relevant knowledge of the disorder’s medical characteristics. Subsequently, the involvement of family members will be crucial especially during the psychotherapy sessions with TBI patients which can be difficult and frustrating at times.

A Framework for Evaluating the Outcomes of an Approach to Personalizing Patient Care

Treatment of patients with psychiatric and neurocognitive symptomatology, which is recorded in some TBI cases, can portray a unique problem. Improvements in psychotherapy can be immensely slowed down by cognitive deficits hence the need to establish a framework for assessing the outcomes of personalized patient care (Rice, 2013). In terms of outcomes, a majority of the reviewed studies entailed mental health variables such as PTSD and depression. Personalized care interventions need to be evaluated to identify the level of mental health condition and evaluation of cognitive functioning. This will involve the use of scales as functional measures to expedite the examination of patients for clinical and study purposes.