Brain Injury and Brain Impairment
Dr. Barth's Work in Regard to Brain Injury and Brain Impairment
Professional Activities:
The American Medical Association has repeatedly asked Dr. Barth to work on AMA publications and programs which have addressed brain injury and brain impairment. Dr. Barth’s work with the AMA has included:
- Serving as a reviewer for the AMA’s Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment
- Specifically including serving as the “final” reviewer for the Central and Peripheral Nervous System chapter (which addresses brain injury and impairment), and the Mental and Behavioral Disorders chapter (which also addresses brain impairment).
- Writing and editing additional AMA publications, addressing issues which have included:
- Brain injury
- concussion
- postconcussion syndrome
- posttraumatic headache
- Additional issues of relevance to brain impairment
- Providing continuing education for the AMA’s
House of Delegates
The American Academy of Disability Evaluating Physicians is the primary source of continuing medical education programming and credit for issues of impairment evaluation and disability evaluation, prevention, and management. Dr. Barth has served for years as a teacher and curriculum planner for this Academy. For example, this Academy chose Dr. Barth to teach medical doctors, nationally and internationally, on the following issues:
- Brain Injury (specifically including diagnosis and impairment considerations for such injuries)
- Postconcussive syndrome
- Posttraumatic headache
The National Academy of Neuropsychology has named Dr. Barth a Fellow of the Academy, for having made a significant contribution to science and practice. This is a peer-nominated and peer-reviewed honor.
Dr. Barth has also served as faculty for additional continuing education programs which addressed brain injury and impairment, for governmental agencies, healthcare and scientific academies in addition to those mentioned above, and universities/medical schools.
Dr. Barth has served on the Board of Directors for chapters of the Brain Injury Association and the Alzheimer’s Association.
Clinical Activities
Dr. Barth has a history of serving as Director of Brain Injury Rehabilitation and Director of Neuropsychology for physical rehabilitation facilities. All components of his clinical work history (e.g. general hospital, rehabilitation hospital, outpatient rehabilitation center, independent practice) have involved working with brain injury and impairment.
Brain Injury and Brain Impairment: Neuropsychology Evaluations and File Reviews
For patients who are suspected of having a history of brain injury or brain impairment, Dr. Barth’s evaluations and file reviews can help clarify issues such as:
- Diagnosis
- Severity of injury
- Severity of impairment
- Confounding factors (non-injury-related issues that can cause the impairment to seem more severe than it actually is, and which are often overlooked)
- Disability
- Competence or competency
- Testamentary capacity
- Prognosis
- Treatment planning
- Rehabilitation
- Additional issues
Typical cases involve patients who have been given a diagnosis of, or who are suspected of warranting a diagnosis of:
- Brain injury
- Closed head injury
- Concussion
- Postconcussion syndrome (or “postconcussional syndrome”, “postconcussional disorder”, “postconcussion disorder”, posttraumatic brain syndrome, etc.)
- Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI)
- Moderate traumatic brain injury (or moderate brain injury, moderate closed head injury, etc.)
- Severe traumatic brain injury (or severe brain injury, severe closed head injury, etc.)
- Dementia of the Alzheimer’s type (or Alzheimer’s disease)
- Dementia due to Stroke (or vascular dementia),
- Mental Retardation
- Learning disability (or learning disorder)
- Substance-induced cognitive impairment: alcohol-induced, drug-induced, Korsakoff's syndrome, etc.
- Encephalitis
- Meningitis
- Brain tumor
- Additional issues involving potential brain impairment
- top -