Gabrielle Giffords' office puts focus on brain-injury care

By Jacquelyn Martin, AP

Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J., accompanied by Lauren Alfred, legislative assistant to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., speaks about treatment for traumatic brain injuries Thursday on Capitol Hill.

EnlargeCloseBy Jacquelyn Martin, AP

Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J., accompanied by Lauren Alfred, legislative assistant to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., speaks about treatment for traumatic brain injuries Thursday on Capitol Hill.

In a letter signed by chief of staff Pia Carusone, Giffords' office urged Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to include brain-trauma rehabilitation services as essential benefits in its Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, despite budget cuts looming in Congress.

RECOVERY: Giffords keeps defying oddsThree months after a gunman shot her in the head during an appearance at a shopping mall, Giffords is undergoing rehabilitation care at TIRR Memorial Hermann Medical Center in Houston. Her staff said they could not provide an update on her condition.

Lauren Alfred, Giffords' legislative aide, said the only reason Giffords has unlimited access to state-of-the-art rehabilitation care is that she was injured on the job, making her eligible for coverage through the federal Workmen's Compensation Act.

Members of the Congressional Brain Injury Task Force, led by Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J., joined the appeal. Pascrell also sent a letter to every member of Congress on Thursday asking for support.

Pascrell acknowledged that the benefits are expensive, but Keith Cicerone, director of neuropsychology at JFK Johnson Rehabilitation Institute in Edison, N.J., said studies show that providing appropriate care is less expensive than warehousing patients in nursing homes or providing round-the-clock home care.

"We appreciate the thoughtful ideas provided by congresswoman Giffords' staff and will certainly take them into account," HHS spokesman Richard Sorian said.

At least 1.7 million people in the USA suffer brain trauma each year, most often from car crashes, strokes, assaults, falls and gun-related incidents, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. Each year, about 50,000 brain-trauma patients die, 230,000 are hospitalized and up to 90,000 survive with long-term disabilities.

Yet insurance benefits for brain-trauma rehabilitation are limited and uneven, not just for civilians but for members of the military injured in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, said Brent Masel, medical director of the Brain Injury Association of America. When the coverage runs out, he said, patients are put into nursing homes or sent to live with relatives.

Marie Beattie, of Lincoln University, Pa., said Thursday that she's locked in a battle with her insurer, a Blue Cross affiliate, and Bryn Mawr Rehabilitation Hospital, to make sure that her daughter, Corey, 18, gets the care she needs to boost her odds of recovering from an October car crash.

Bryn Mawr administrators told Beattie on Tuesday that Corey, who can't speak and is learning to lift her arms, would be sent to a nursing home Thursday to give her mother — a single parent with three children earning $53,000 a year — time to prepare to care for her at home.

Corey has already been denied by 20 nursing homes, Beattie said, because they're not equipped to care for patients with brain injuries. "Where is this child supposed to go?" she said.

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