A traumatic brain injury (TBI) can happen when an external force causes damage to the brain. Common causes of TBI include falls, automobile accidents, and sports injuries. There are many different names for TBI such as concussion, Shaken Baby Syndrome, head injury, or anoxia (loss of oxygen) due to trauma. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2020 there were approximately 214,110 TBI-related hospitalizations and 69,473 TBI-related deaths in 2021. Not included in these estimates are TBIs treated in primary care or urgent cases, TBIs sustained by military service members, TBIs treated in the emergency department only, and TBIs that are untreated.
TBI can affect various aspects of a person's life. People living with TBI and their families often require a range of services and supports to allow an individual to maintain a safe and secure environment in the housing setting of their choice. Individual needs are different and can change over time, so it is important that systems provide person-centered services and supports.
- Building Partnerships to Enhance Housing Stability for People with Traumatic Brain Injury
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One strategy to increase access to services for individuals with TBI is to form partnerships between disability, aging, health, and housing organizations that already provide some form of services in the community. Such partnerships bring together the capabilities and funding streams of multiple sectors.
The HSRC resources below provide insights into and suggestions for building partnerships so that people with TBI have ready access to services they need.
- Building and Sustaining Responsive Housing-Services Partnerships for Housing Stability — Snapshot of housing, aging, disability, health, and Money Follows the Person Program partnerships in North Dakota
- Reducing Homelessness With Affordable, Accessible Housing for People With Disabilities — Snapshot of assistive technology, disability, and homeless services systems partnerships in New York
- TBI Resource Center
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TBI Technical Assistance and Resource Center
ACL’s TBI Technical Assistance and Resource Center (TBI TARC) helps TBI State Partnership Program grantees promote access to integrated, coordinated services and supports for people who have sustained a TBI, their families, and their caregivers. TBI TARC also provides a variety of resources to non-grantee states, people affected by brain injury, policymakers, and providers.
TBI TARC is committed to integrating the voice of people with lived experience of TBI into its products, resources, and technical assistance approach. Its activities are overseen and guided by people with lived experience and other subject matter experts.
- TBI Funding Streams
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Sustaining access to services across the community necessitates the use of multiple funding streams. The following resources provide concrete facts, links, promising practices, and approaches to funding in both federally subsidized housing and in the community.
- ACL’s Traumatic Brain Injury State Partnership Program (TBI SPP) — The program currently has a total of 31 grantees. The goal is to create and strengthen systems of services and supports that maximizes the independence, health and well-being of people with traumatic brain injuries across the lifespan, their family members, and their support networks
- Public Health Workforce Fund — In 2022, 25 TBI grantees were awarded funding to expand the public health workforce that supports people with TBI to promote health equity
- Tools and Resources for TBI Services
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Expand your knowledge and understanding of how to build partnerships with help from these tools and training resources.
- Behavioral Health Guide: Considerations for Best Practices for Children, Youth, and Adults With TBI — ACL's Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Technical Assistance and Resource Center’s (TARC) "Behavioral Health Guide: Considerations for Best Practices for Children, Youth, and Adults With TBI" was designed to provide state brain injury professionals with the tools to effectively partner with their state behavioral health entities and improve outcomes for this population
- Building Up TBI Systems: Tools for Successful TBI State Programs — Since 1997, grantees have worked to increase access to brain injury services and to bolster the systems that advocate on behalf of people seeking services. The considerations and strategies laid out here are based on these grantees’ experiences. Broken out by program stage, they are useful for states at all levels of program and system development — from those that are just beginning to develop infrastructure to those with developed infrastructure in place
- Model Systems Knowledge Translation Center: Traumatic Brain Injury— This NIDILRR-funded national center translates health information into easy-to-understand language and formats for people with traumatic brain injury and their families and caregivers. The center reviews and synthesizes current research, publishes articles and technical reports, develops knowledge translation tools, and creates client and family resources to inform clinical practice
- TBI Model Systems National Data and Statistical Center— This NIDILRR-funded center is a point of contact for public access to information from and data in the nationally-representative, longitudinal TBI Model Systems National Database. The database includes those who receive inpatient rehabilitation for TBI
- Adapting Your Practice: Recommendations for the Care of Patients Who Are Homeless or Unstably Housed Living With the Effects of Traumatic Brain Injury— From the National Health Care for the Homeless Council, this resource aims to help health care professionals, program administrators, other staff, and students serving individuals with TBI who are homeless or at risk for homelessness
- Defense Health Agency’s Traumatic Brain Injury Center of Excellence— This part of the military health system provides TBI clinical tools, educational resources, and research information