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Training:
Strategies for working with people with ABI
When:
May 15,  1 - 4 PM
Trainer:
Michelle Tehan, OT
Details:
see training page

About ABI

 

ABI stands for acquired brain injury

According to the 1993 Australian Bureau of Statistics disability survey, over 160,000 Australians (0.9% of the population) reported an ABI-related disabling condition (see Fortune & Wen, 1999). Hence ABI is quite common, and that figure can be compared with the estimate of intellectual disability prevalence (1.0%; Wen, 1997).

ABI is often confused with intellectual disability and mental illness.

A key aspect of ABI is that the injury is “acquired”; that is, a person has been going through a normal developmental process (e.g., attending regular school, appropriate interpersonal relationships, regular employment, …) but this is disrupted by injury

The injuries can occur in different ways such as:

  • Stroke 
  • Trauma (e.g., assault)
  • Tumour
  • Infection
  • Substantial alcohol and other drug use
  • Hypoxic events (e.g., heart attack, near drowning)
Brain injury affects different people in different ways, but some common effects on thinking include:
  • Impaired memory
  • Difficulty planning and problem solving
  • Slowed thinking
  • Difficulty learning new things.
Often people are unaware that they might have an ABI, not realising that the difficulties they experience relate back to an accident many years ago, or that substantial alcohol consumption is ‘catching up with them’.