The room at the Malcom Randall VA Medical Center had the look and feel of a science fair.
Researchers stood next to the folding tables where copies of their most recent studies were stacked in neat piles. Behind each table, poster boards featured illustrations and step-by-step explanations of each study from the question, through the test process, to the conclusion.
This was one high-tech science fair.
To celebrate a recent $4.5 million, five-year grant award from the Department of Veterans Affairs, the National Veterans Affairs Brain Rehabilitation Research Center, a partnership of UF Health Shands Hospital, Malcom Randall VA and Brooks Rehabilitation Hospital in Jacksonville, put on an open house to display some of their ongoing research work on the brain and its ability to recover from injury and disease.
Around the room, laptop computers and flatscreen monitors displayed images of the brain or 3-D images of the human skeleton that are used in studies on the recovery of movement and the ability to walk after a stroke.
A mannequin head stood on one table with what looked to be a blue bandana with white polka dots wrapped around it. In reality, that bandana was an EEG cap and those polka dots were electrodes placed on the scalp to read the electrical activity of the brain. It was another piece of ongoing research to help stroke victims regain the grasping control of their hands and other motor skills.
At another table, a poster display maps out the steps of a study comparing white matter connectivity in the brains of 13 veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who have mild traumatic brain injury or post-traumatic stress disorder with the connectivity of 13 people of roughly the same ages.
In all, 28 VA-funded investigators and 16 affiliate investigators do work for the Brain Rehabilitation Research Center. Janis J. Daly, the director of the center, said their shared goal is finding better ways to treat veterans from a cross-section of generations.
There are the younger veterans who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan with a traumatic brain injury or PTSD. There are the older veterans, who may face Parkinsons disease or stroke as they age.
The quality of care we are able to provide veterans today is immeasurably better than what we could provide 40 years ago, Thomas Wisnieski, the director of the North Florida South/Georgia Veterans Health System, told the crowd. The single largest reason is medical research.
In a side room stood another piece of equipment researchers are using in an effort to further advance treatment. This robotic gait-training device is, in laymans terms, a treadmill equipped with a harness and a computer screen.
Used in conjunction with brain monitoring equipment, the gait training machine will monitor motor control from the brain down, researcher Eric Walker said, with the goal of helping post-stroke patients restore both their ability to walk and their brain function.
