Member Spotlight: Headway
Brain Awareness Week 2024
During Brain Awareness Week 2024, we will be highlighting some of our fantastic member organisations.
Today we are highlighting Headway – the brain injury association
What is an acquired brain injury?
An acquired brain injury (ABI) is an injury caused to the brain since birth.
Acquired brain injury can have a number of different causes. Some of the most common types of brain injury include:
Traumatic brain injury (for instance road traffic collisions, falls or assaults)
Minor head injury and concussion (loss of consciousness of less than 15 minutes)
Aneurysm (also known as a cerebral aneurysm)
Brain haemorrhage (also known as a haemorrhagic stroke)
Brain tumour
Carbon monoxide poisoning
Encephalitis
Hypoxic/anoxic brain injury (caused a reduction or loss of oxygen to the brain)
Meningitis
Stroke
A brain injury can lead to a wide range of effects. While many people recover quickly after a minor head injury (often known as concussion), this is not always the case and people may experience longer-term effects.
Who are Headway?
Brain injury can challenge every aspect of your life – walking, talking, thinking and feeling – and the losses can be severe and permanent. It can mean losing both the life you once lived and the person you once were.
Headway is the UK-wide charity that works to improve life after brain injury by providing vital support and information services.
We all think 'it will never happen to me', but every year around 350,000 people are admitted to hospital with an acquired brain injury.
That's one every 90 seconds.
A brain injury can happen to anyone, at any time. When it does, Headway is here to help.
The charity also lobbies for better support and resources to be made available to people affected by brain injury and works to raise awareness of brain injury and the devastating effects it can have.
What support does Headway offer?
National support
Headway offers support across the UK via these national services:
a freephone helpline (0808 800 2244, helpline@headway.org.uk);
a comprehensive award-winning website containing information and factsheets on all aspects of brain injury (www.headway.org.uk);
an award-winning range of booklets and publications designed to help people understand and cope with the effects of brain injury;
an emergency fund to assist people dealing with the financial implications in the immediate aftermath of a brain injury;
a Brain Injury Identity Card to help in everyday situations and if you come into contact with the criminal justice system;
a directory of approved residential homes, rehabilitation units and respite facilities specialising in ABI.
Local support
Headway in NI provide weekly groups which provide physical, social and emotional activity to adults with an acquired brain injury and offer carer support.
In addition to the services shown above, a network of Headway groups and branches across the UK and Channel Islands provides a wide range of services including rehabilitation programmes, carer support, social re-integration, community outreach and respite care to survivors and families in their own communities.
How can people contact Headway?
Melanie Bowden Network support manager in NI (Melanie.bowden@headway.org.uk)