Brain Injury Statistics

Prevention is the only cure for brain injury


Brain Injury in Texas

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 144,000 Texans sustain a traumatic brain injury each year, one every 4 minutes. More than 381,000 Texans are living with a disability due to Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and more than 5,700 are permanently disabled by traumatic brain injury each year.

Brain Injury in the United States

  • The CDC indicates that 5.3 million Americans - a little more than 2% of the U.S. population- currently live with disabilities resulting from brain injury.
  • 1.5 million people sustain a brain injury every year.
  • The cost of TBI is $50 billion annually.
  • Every 21 seconds an infant, child, teenager or adult in the U.S. sustains a traumatic brain injury - Each day 4,100 individuals sustain a traumatic brain injury.
  • Fewer than 1 in 20 people with traumatic brain injury will receive the rehabilitation that they need.
  • TBI is the leading cause of death and disability among children and young adults.
  • TBI is the 4th leading cause of death overall.
  • TBI results in 1-1/2 times more deaths each year than AIDS.
  • Each year 230,000 persons are hospitalized with traumatic brain injury and survive.
  • Falls are leading causes of traumatic brain injury for persons 65 and older.
  • Transportation related injuries are leading causes of traumatic brain injury among persons 15-64.
  • More Americans died as a result of traumatic brain injury between 1981 and 1993 than have been killed in all the wars in our history combined.
  • More than 50% of all motor vehicle accidents resulting in TBI involve alcohol.
  • Traumatic brain injury accounts for more years of lost productivity than any other injury.

These numbers do not take into account the incidence of other types of Acquired Brain Injury, such as stroke, encephalitis and other infectious diseases, anoxic/hypoxic injury (lack of oxygen to the brain), aneurysms, siezure disorders, surgical procedures, and toxic exposure.

Brain injury has become a national epidemic. It is estimated that more that 50,000 Americans die annually from brain injuries and that over 300,000 have injuries severe enough to require hospitalization. Of this group, approximately 80,000 people a year are left with cognitive or behavioral deficits of such a degree as to result in lifelong disabilities. Males aged 14 to 24 years are at highest risk. Community facilities for the rehabilitation of persons with brain injury are limited and in many areas nonexistent. As a result, survivors of brain injury have often been silently and shamefully closeted away in psychiatric institutions or nursing homes.