Harvard Health Blog: " Intimate partner violence and traumatic brain injury: An 'invisible' public health epidemic" - "While studying brain injuries in the mid-1990s, I began volunteering in a domestic violence shelter. LISTEN: A 'First Person' diary featuring Freya Doe. 'The shame did not belong to me.
Co-author of “ Trauma-Informed Approaches." ( Also Featured Founder and director of the Center on Partner-Inflicted Brain Injury, a project run by the Ohio Domestic Violence Network. Associate professor at Harvard Medical School and research scientist at Massachusetts General Hospital. GuestsĮve Valera, PhD, neuroscientist with more than 20 years of experience researching traumatic brain injury resulting from intimate partner violence. Today, On Point: Survivors of domestic violence on living with traumatic brain injury. It's here now, and it's going to be here in the future," neuroscientist Eve Valera says. So why is there so little research, and awareness? "Problems with balance, problems with vision, sensory problems, seizures, headaches," Ramirez says. Listen: A survivor discovers her brain injury, and takes her power back. How had we not thought about that before?’ But we really have not made that connection," licensed social worker Rachel Ramirez says.Īnd yet millions of survivors have been living with the impacts of these brain injuries, sometimes for decades. "When you think about domestic violence and brain injury, almost everyone I talked to was like, ‘Oh my gosh, that totally makes sense. The suffering caused by domestic violence is emotional, spiritual and physical.īut there's one aspect of that suffering that is almost invisible.
Call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at (7233), or visit. (In Pictures Ltd./Corbis via Getty Images)Įditor's Note: If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse, use a safe computer and contact help.