The 2024 West Coast Brain Injury Conference took place in Kelowna on Tuesday, bringing together change makers and leading minds in the field of brain injury, public health and politics to discuss breakthroughs, issues and solutions.
This year’s theme was Brain Injury Breakthroughs: Current Issues and Emerging Solutions
Kelowna’s local charity BrainTrust, is currently on the map as an active participant in proposed Bill C277, an act to establish a National Strategy on Brain Injury.
“Today is a significant event for us because a lot of our delegates and partners across the country are here in support of hopefully passing bill C277, a national strategy on brain injury,” said BrainTrust Canada executive director Amanda McFarlane.
BC Brain Injury Association executive director Janelle Breese-Biagioni adds, “BrainTrust Canada, Brain Injury Canada, Cowichan Brain Injury Society, lots of them have come together and are really working hard to get this bill forward… And when that goes through, we will have a framework for the country on prevention, awareness, treatment and rehabilitation.”
According to BrainTrust Canada, roughly 80 per cent of people with brain injuries go undiagnosed, with many of those being related to drug overdose, homelessness and criminality.
“Brain injury is directly linked to all of that, and so if they continue to work in silos and putting bandaids on it, we’re never going to resolve it,” said Breese-Biagioni.
“What are the best practices in research? What are the best practices in service delivery? And how can we get services to people in areas where they don’t have services?… There’s always been a promise of having services close to home and that’s not happening. We are looking to change that so that people are with their families, their social connections and they get the services that they need.”
As groups continue to push for a national strategy for brain injuries, the BC Brain Injury Association says it’s important to find community support right now.
“We need to get funding to the associations across the country and to places where they don’t have those community associations or provincial representation. We need to get funding there to build the infrastructure so that people can get those services and support. Everything from life skills to counselling, it’s really important.”
While the country anxiously awaits the status of Bill C277, Breese-Biagioni says that for every drug overdose death in BC, there’s an additional 20-30 undiagnosed brain injuries.
 "BCCI want Test specialists to play domestic cricket; Rohit, Virat, Bumrah to be exceptions")
