Brain Health, Brain Injury Pioneers Receive SJBF Angel Awards

Today, May 8th, 2014, we are pleased to rec­og­nize the fol­low­ing amaz­ing peo­ple, from jour­nal­ists to clin­i­cians to brain injury sur­vivors and their fam­i­ly mem­bers, with the Annu­al Sarah Jane Brain Foun­da­tion Angel Awards. These pres­ti­gious awards are named after the lead­ing experts in the world deal­ing with brain injury (the num­ber one cause of death and dis­abil­i­ty for chil­dren and young adults up to age 25 in the U.S.), and are being giv­en to some of the most promi­nent and accom­plished mem­bers of the Pedi­atric Acquired Brain Injury (PABI) com­mu­ni­ty, in recog­ni­tion for their hard work and ded­i­ca­tion to fur­ther­ing the field.

This year’s Angel Awards:

The Dr. San­jay Gup­ta Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a jour­nal­ist who has demon­strat­ed lead­er­ship in advanc­ing the knowl­edge of the brain as well as an under­stand­ing of the impact of brain injury and oth­er brain-based disorders

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Bob Woodruff, is a jour­nal­ist who sus­tained a seri­ous brain injury in Iraq on Jan­u­ary 29, 2006, while report­ing on U.S. and Iraqi forces for ABC’s “World News Tonight.” 13 months after his injury he returned to ABC News and has con­tin­ued to report from around the globe for the net­work. Bob and his wife, Lee, pub­lished an account of their lives after his injury, In an Instant: A Family’s Jour­ney of Love and Heal­ing. In addi­tion, they start­ed the Bob Woodruff Foun­da­tion, the non-prof­it ded­i­cat­ed to ensur­ing that post‑9/11 injured ser­vice mem­bers, vet­er­ans and their fam­i­lies thrive long after they return home. To date, the Bob Woodruff Foun­da­tion has invest­ed more than $20 mil­lion in find­ing, fund­ing and shap­ing inno­v­a­tive solu­tions across the coun­try, reach­ing more than 1 mil­lion ser­vice mem­bers, sup­port per­son­nel, vet­er­ans and their families.
• About San­jay Gup­ta: Dr. Gup­ta is the mul­ti­ple Emmy-award win­ning chief med­ical cor­re­spon­dent for CNN, report­ing on health and med­ical news for New Day, Ander­son Coop­er 360°, CNN doc­u­men­taries and anchors the week­end med­ical affairs pro­gram, San­jay Gup­ta, MD. He is a prac­tic­ing neu­ro­sur­geon and an assis­tant pro­fes­sor of neu­ro­surgery at Emory Uni­ver­si­ty Hos­pi­tal and Grady Memo­r­i­al Hos­pi­tal, where he serves as asso­ciate chief of neurosurgery.

The Diane Gooch Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a brain injury pro­fes­sion­al who advances the link between brain injury and oth­er co-mor­bidi­ties such as sub­stance abuse or men­tal ill­ness through their research

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: John D. Cor­ri­g­an, PhD, ABPP is the Direc­tor of the Divi­sion of Reha­bil­i­ta­tion Psy­chol­o­gy and a Pro­fes­sor in the Depart­ment of Phys­i­cal Med­i­cine and Reha­bil­i­ta­tion at the Ohio State Uni­ver­si­ty; Direc­tor of the Ohio Val­ley Cen­ter for Brain Injury Pre­ven­tion and Reha­bil­i­ta­tion; Project Direc­tor for the Ohio Region­al Trau­mat­ic Brain Injury Mod­el Sys­tem, a mul­ti-cen­ter, lon­gi­tu­di­nal research pro­gram fund­ed by the Nation­al Insti­tute on Dis­abil­i­ty and Reha­bil­i­ta­tion Research; Chair of the Exec­u­tive Com­mit­tee of the TBI Mod­el Sys­tems Project Direc­tors; and he is Edi­tor-in-Chief of the Jour­nal of Head Trau­ma Reha­bil­i­ta­tion.
• About Diane Gooch: Diane is the Co-Host of a week­ly radio pro­gram, Radio LifeBoat, with her son, Mick­ey Gooch who is an aspir­ing young actor, come­di­an and writer recov­er­ing from the tur­moil of years of life-threat­en­ing addic­tion to alco­hol and drugs; Diane is a for­mer New Jer­sey news­pa­per pub­lish­er and cur­rent­ly a prin­ci­pal in the Wash­ing­ton, DC-based Talk Radio News Service.

The Col. Jack H. Jacobs Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a vet­er­an who sus­tained a trau­mat­ic brain injury dur­ing war while they were under 25 years of age and who upon their return home con­tin­ues to show lead­er­ship and courage

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Sergeant First Class (SFC) Cory Rems­burg was severe­ly injured on Octo­ber 1, 2009, while serv­ing his 10^th com­bat rota­tion in Afghanistan deployed with US Spe­cial Oper­a­tions Com­mand, 1^st Bat­tal­ion, 75^th Ranger Reg­i­ment and spent 3 ½ years at numer­ous hos­pi­tals recov­er­ing; he has received numer­ous medals and awards includ­ing the Bronze Star, Pur­ple Heart, Joint Ser­vice Com­men­da­tion Medal, Army Com­men­da­tion Medal with Val­or and Pres­i­dent Oba­ma rec­og­nized his lead­er­ship and courage dur­ing the 2014 State of the Union Address to Con­gress where he sat next to First Lady Michelle Obama
• About Jack Jacobs: Colonel Jacobs is a retired U.S. Army offi­cer who was award­ed a Medal of Hon­or for his his­toric actions dur­ing the Viet­nam War and cur­rent­ly serves as a mil­i­tary ana­lyst for MSNBC and Vice Chair­man of the Con­gres­sion­al Medal of Hon­or Foundation.

The Dr. David Hov­da Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a clin­i­cian who exem­pli­fies com­pas­sion and com­mit­ment for pedi­atric acquired brain injured chil­dren, young adults and their families

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Ger­ard Gioia, Ph.D., Chief, Divi­sion of Pedi­atric Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy and Direc­tor, Safe Con­cus­sion Out­come, Recov­ery & Edu­ca­tion (SCORE) Pro­gram at Children’s Nation­al Health Sys­tem; Pro­fes­sor, Depart­ments of Pedi­atrics and Psy­chi­a­try, George Wash­ing­ton Uni­ver­si­ty School of Medicine
• About Dr. David Hov­da: Dr. Hov­da is the Direc­tor of the UCLA Brain Injury Research Cen­ter and imme­di­ate past-Pres­i­dent of the Inter­na­tion­al Nuero­trau­ma Soci­ety; he is also an advi­sor to the Pen­ta­gon on brain injuries.

The Dr. Krist­jan Rag­nars­son Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a lead­ing researcher who is advanc­ing the field of pedi­atric acquired brain injury

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Peter D. Patrick, Ph.D., Pro­fes­sor Emer­i­tus, Neu­ropsy­chol­o­gy, Depart­ment of Pedi­atrics, Uni­ver­si­ty of Vir­ginia Med­ical School; Pro­fes­sor, Cur­ry School of Edu­ca­tion, Uni­ver­si­ty of Virginia
• About Dr. Krist­jan Rag­nars­son: Dr. Rag­nars­son is a Pro­fes­sor and Chair of Reha­bil­i­ta­tive Med­i­cine at Mount Sinai School of Med­i­cine and among many pro­fes­sion­al activ­i­ties, he was Chair­man of the NIH con­sen­sus Con­fer­ence on Reha­bil­i­ta­tion of Per­sons with Trau­mat­ic Brain Injury.

The Mar­i­lyn Spi­vack Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a lead­ing brain injury pro­fes­sion­al who has ded­i­cat­ed their career to sup­port­ing fam­i­lies who have a child with an acquired brain injury

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Bar­bara Geiger-Park­er, Pres­i­dent and CEO, Brain Injury Alliance of New Jer­sey; Co-Founder and Chair­man of Board, Unit­ed States Brain Injury Alliance
• About Mar­i­lyn Spi­vack: Mar­i­lyn is the Neu­ro­trau­ma Out­reach Coor­di­na­tor at Spauld­ing Reha­bil­i­ta­tion Hos­pi­tal and Founder of The Brain Injury Asso­ci­a­tion of Amer­i­ca. The award is in hon­or of her daugh­ter, Deb­o­rah, who sus­tained a brain injury due to a motor vehi­cle crash in 1975 when she was just 15-years old.

The Cyn­thia Gibbs Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a par­ent or care­giv­er of a child or young adult with a PABI who has sig­nif­i­cant­ly advanced the field of PABI through their advocacy

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Tere­sa Mor­ros; is the moth­er of 21-year-old Josh Mor­ros who suf­fered a severe brain injury as the youngest pro­fes­sion­al motocross rid­er when he was 16 years-old; Josh set up an orga­ni­za­tion, Because I Can, and he bicy­cled across the coun­try (2788 miles) with his moth­er and father rid­ing behind him to raise aware­ness of brain injury; she is cur­rent­ly the Pres­i­dent of the Head Injury Asso­ci­a­tion of North­ern Nevada
• About Cyn­thia Gibbs: Cyn­thia was shak­en and killed by her baby-sit­ter when she was just eight months old; her lega­cy lives on in the dai­ly advo­ca­cy her father, Dar­ryl, has pro­vid­ed to hun­dreds of fam­i­lies across the country.

The Zach­ery Lyst­edt Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a pro­fes­sion­al who advances the pre­ven­tion, iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and treat­ment of brain injury in youth ath­letes and oth­er at-risk groups

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Christo­pher C. Giza, M.D., Pro­fes­sor of Pedi­atric Neu­rol­o­gy and Neu­ro­surgery, UCLA Brain Injury Research Cen­ter, UCLA Brain­SPORT: Sports Con­cus­sion – Mild TBI Pro­gram, Inter­de­part­men­tal Pro­grams for Neu­ro­science and Bio­med­ical Engi­neer­ing, David Gef­fen School of Med­i­cine at UCLA and Mat­tel Children’s Hos­pi­tal — UCLA
• About Zach­ery Lyst­edt: Zach is a remark­ably brave 19-year old from Wash­ing­ton State who sus­tained a debil­i­tat­ing brain injury play­ing foot­ball in 2006 after return­ing to play too quick­ly fol­low­ing a con­cus­sion; and through his and his par­ents’ efforts they have inspired a nation­al move­ment to pre­vent, iden­ti­fy and treat youth sports-relat­ed brain injuries

The Sarah Jane Dono­hue Angel Award is pre­sent­ed to a child or young adult suf­fer­ing from a PABI who has strived to advance the field of PABI since sus­tain­ing their injury

• Angel Award Recip­i­ent: Bryan Stein­hauer, CPA suf­fered a life-threat­en­ing brain injury after he was bru­tal­ly attacked at Bing­ham­ton Uni­ver­si­ty when he was a senior hon­ors stu­dent in 2008; he has set up an orga­ni­za­tion, Minds Over Mat­ter to sup­port young peo­ple with trau­mat­ic brain injury and while he was not expect­ed to ever walk again after his brain injury, he ran in the 2013 NYC Marathon and cur­rent­ly works as a CPA at KPMG
• About Sarah Jane Dono­hue: Sarah Jane is an eight-year-old who suf­fers from an acquired brain injury due to abu­sive head trau­ma when she was just five days old; she is a stu­dent at The Inter­na­tion­al Acad­e­my of HOPE (iHOPE) and she is epony­mous with The Sarah Jane Brain Foundation.

To Learn More:

• Web­site of the Sarah Jane Brain Project
• Live web­cast from the Award Cer­e­mo­ny Here (requires registration)
• Inter­view with Patrick Dono­hue: Rein­vent­ing Brain Care Through Pol­i­cy, Stan­dards, Tech, Neuroinformatics
• Lee Woodruff: the Bob Woodruff Foun­da­tion, and You, can help Trau­mat­ic Brain Injury survivors