Giffords' office: Close gap in traumatic brain-injury care

Staff members for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, R-Ariz., have become key advocates in a campaign to ensure that the health law guarantees high levels of care for people who suffer traumatic brain injuries.

The Washington Post: Giffords's Office Seeks To Close Gap In Traumatic Brain-Injury Care
Staff members for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) have emerged as key advocates in a campaign to ensure the new health care law guarantees more Americans who suffer traumatic brain injuries the high quality of care the congresswoman is receiving to recover from a January shooting (Aizenman, 4/21).

ProPublica: Giffords' Office Urges Obama Admin to Close the Treatment Gap for Brain Injuries
[A] "central component" of Giffords' therapy regimen is cognitive rehabilitation therapy, a costly medical treatment designed to retrain the brain to do basic tasks. Such treatment, as we noted in January, may be available to Giffords, but it is out of reach for thousands of U.S. troops whose health coverage doesn't include it. The Pentagon's health care program, Tricare, has refused to cover it but does cover certain types of therapy — such as speech and occupational therapy — which can be a part of cognitive rehabilitation therapy. Tricare officials have said that scientific evidence does not justify providing it comprehensively to troops (Wang, 4/20).