of women in prison have suffered brain injuries, frequently the result of domestic violence. But hardly any are screened or treated behind bars, workers say, so many continue struggling with symptoms after being released, sometimes only for the cycle to repeat.
"Despite how many people I've seen in these scenarios, there are times I have to come back to my office and just close the door for a little while," says Dr Zieman, a neurologist and medical director of the Domestic Violence Brain Injury Program at the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix, Arizona. "It's a lot to hear what one human can do to another."
The second feature is their vulnerability. TBIs affect patients' ability to think clearly — a dangerous situation for women experiencing domestic abuse, a hallmark of which is"So if someone is not functioning at their best … that can be used as a tool to enable further injury and abuse, because victims can't … [necessarily] defend themselves and … navigate themselves to safety," Dr Zieman says.