New Blood Test Offers Hope of Detecting Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

TBI, which affects 1.4 million Americans every year, has always been a challenge for doctors to correctly identify, as X-rays and MRIs often do not detect the damage. Now a blood test has been developed that claims to have an accuracy rate of over 90% for mild traumatic brain injury. This is such a new discovery that it may not be available everywhere, but we expect to hear more about it in the near future.

UPDATE: The Cleveland Clinic in Ohio is doing cutting-edge research on a concussion blood test that can help identify closed-head brain injuries at a fraction of the cost of a CT scan.

"A team of Cleveland Clinic researchers, led by Damir Janigro, Ph.D., are developing a blood test that can help predict the seriousness of brain injury by detecting the status of the blood-brain barrier.

"If a protein (S100B) present only in the brain appears in serum, then the BBB is breached and the patient should be further evaluated.

"If measured within four hours of the injury, the S100B test accurately predicts which head injury patients will have a traumatic abnormality on a head CT scan...."

GlaxoSmithKline to Pay $750 Million Penalty!

MSNBC reports that this major pharmaceutical company is paying a high price for substandard practices at their Cidra, Puerto Rico plant (no longer in operation). One of the products of this plant was Paxil CR (extended-release antidepressant).