Birth Brain Injury at Army Hospital Results in $11 Million Settlement

Legal settlement papers for birth brain injury

On September 11, 2021, Sarah Panter delivered a daughter at Blanchfield Army Community Hospital at Fort Campbell. She was then given Pitocin, a synthetic medication version of oxytocin used to induce pregnancy.  Monitors signaled fetal distress, a noted effect of the drug, and Panter’s attorneys say a C-section should then have been offered, to prevent the infant from injury. Instead, hours later, a midwife delivered the baby, who initially didn’t breathe.

Panther’s daughter now lives with hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy, brain damage that occurs when a newborn’s brain does not get enough oxygen or blood flow before, during, or right after birth. Additionally, the child lives with cerebral palsy, epilepsy and cortical blindness, known consequences of brain injury. She also cannot walk or sit unaided, uses a feeding tube, and needs round-the-clock nursing for life.

While birth injury is known to “only” be about 2% for normal vaginal delivery and 1% for cesarean delivery, statistics in the United States report that that birth injury occurs in about 25.3 to 31.1 cases per 1000 hospital births. Because the head is typically the first part to enter the birth canal, it is also the most vulnerable and, therefore, common birth injury, as recognized by various studies available in the NLM database.

In September 2026, the Justice Department agreed to an $11 million settlement funding a lifetime-care trust. While the government settled mid-trial, prior to the judge’s ruling, it has not formally accepted responsibility.

An Investigation into the Navy’s Response

On September 8, 2026, House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer and Subcommittee on Military and Foreign Affairs Chairman William Timmons released “Unseen Impacts.” This report capped an investigation that began last year into the Navy’s Project Odin’s Eye, which purportedly delved into potential brain injury in naval aviators who routinely endure up to nine Gs, from catapult launches and high-G turns. Navy medical officials then reasoned, in Catch-22 fashion, that with no evidence a problem existed, no study was needed. Therefore, none was done.

This secret TOPGUN program wasn’t disclosed to Navy leadership until the New York Times exposed it in 2024. Now, after examining Project Odin’s Eye, investigators have concluded that the program’s “research” wasn’t TRUE research.  Based on this new information, the Committee and Subcommittee are now urging Congress to mandate a comprehensive long-term aviator brain health study.

For more information on Project Odin’s Eye: https://tbionthehill.com/2025/09/17/navys-secret-brain-injury-study/

America’s Silent Emergency, Stroke Act Waits While Senate in Recess

Ben Ray Luján seated in an office beside New Mexico and American flags

“Someone dies of a stroke every 3 minutes and 14 seconds in the United States,” states the CEO of the American Heart Association.” Every second matters when someone experiences a stroke,” Senator Ben Ray Luján (NM) confirms. Luján is himself a stroke survivor, as in 2022 he survived a cerebellar stroke that required emergency brain surgery. On August 5, 2026, he introduced S.5260, the Stroke Act. “I know firsthand how critical it is to receive the right care at the right time.”

The Stroke Act aims to improve stroke care, research, data collection, and prevention nationwide. The bill would authorize $25 million per year through 2032 for NIH research, a CDC national stroke registry, systems-of-care grants, and a public education campaign. Significantly, it is not the first such effort; it follows decades of stroke legislation, including the STOP Stroke Act and the FAST Act.

The current bill has been endorsed by the American Heart Association, in addition to 10 co-sponsors. Though the co-sponsors, including Senator Fetterman, himself a stroke survivor, follow party lines, no opposition to S.5260 has been documented. Upon being introduced, the bill was referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions; no further action on the bill has been taken because of Senate’s August recess. 

Parents File Lawsuit After NJ Child’s Tragedy in a “Safe Sport”, Previously Studied for TBI Benefits 

Badminton is one of the safest recreational sports, but as with all sports, it isn’t risk-free. The 2024 death of six-year-old Lucy Morgan of Stockholm, New Jersey, shows how a freak accident can turn devastating, even for spectators. On June 1, 2024, Lucy was sitting on the sideline when the aluminum shaft of a badminton racquet dislodged from its wooden handle and struck her in the head, piercing her skull. Surgeons operated to reduce brain swelling, but she died from her injuries on June 5, 2024. In August 2026, her parents filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the sports center, alleging the racket was defective.

Wheelchair badminton player and standing opponent reaching for shuttlecock

The federal government has long been aware that, as with all sports, badminton can cause injury. In 1990, the National Library of Medicine published a report that found for those who suffered a badminton injury, 1.8 percent had a head injury. Decades later, the government examined the benefits of badminton: in 2022, an NLM-published review of 27 studies that related to “’badminton AND health’ and ‘badminton AND benefits’” The analysis was that “compared with other types of physical sporting activities, badminton offers, for the most part, better outcomes pertaining to the three types of health (physical, mental and social), with benefits also seen for disabled individuals and even in visual health.”

Guidance is consistent about when and to what level a brain-injured individual should begin playing sports again, including badminton, advising that you should only start a sport or exercise once you’ve had medical clearance by a doctor. After that, the recommendation is that you progress slowly, while you enjoy its benefits.

Diagnose TBI, No Blood Draw Necessary

The military’s effort to create a system to easily and quickly test for a brain injury did not end with the i-STAT blood test, that I first reported in 2017. The DHA (Defense Health Agency), a federal Combat Support Agency, is now promoting a new product with the same goal. However, this new DHA product takes a different route.

Camp Lejeune entrance sign reading Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune

On June 30, Navy Hospital Corpsmen from II Marine Expeditionary Force, located at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, tested diagnoses prototypes under the Traumatic Brain Injury Field Assessment Program: A handheld hemorrhage detector, a non-invasive scanner like low-power radiofrequency waves, was tested, as it measured changes in optical density or electromagnetic fields. Additionally, medics tested a number of digital neurocognitive assessments. This testing software can be stored on a phone or tablet, thereby replacing paper-and-pencil assessments. Importantly, the prototypes tested do not require blood proteins and, therefore, no blood draw is needed for diagnosis.

Federal Crackdown on Commercial Truck Drivers Beyond Immigration

In 2024, Dalilah Coleman was critically injured when an 18-wheeler truck crashed on a California road that the government attributes to an undocumented immigrant driver. On August 31, 2026, in Detroit, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, joined by Dalilah and her father, announced a major interagency crackdown on the trucking industry, targeting fraud. This fraud specifically applies to commercial licenses and unlicensed, non-English-proficient drivers, as Mullin had warned that unqualified drivers who cannot “understand the rules of the road” are endangering Americans.

Emergency crews respond to a truck and car collision on highway

Motor-vehicle crashes cause about 24.5 percent of all traumatic brain injury hospitalizations. A loaded tractor-trailer presents more danger because it can outweigh a passenger car twentyfold. In 2024, crashes involving large trucks killed 5,340 people and injured an estimated 161,201. Data isolating brain injuries caused by unlicensed commercial drivers does not yet exist, but enforcement figures hint at the scale.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration also announced the emergency removal of certifications for 110 CDL schools, and the proposed removal of certifications of dozens of other training schools. Totaling over of 160 schools, and associated with more than 5,000 drivers, the FMCSA cites these school for certifying drivers who fail English language proficiency tests. Additionally, since 2025, the USDOT put more than 28,000 drivers “out of service” for English language proficiency violations, though this equals a temporary stop, not a license revocation. They also forced states to cancel over 30,000 improperly issued licenses.

Head Injury Sidelines AR Justice, Prompting Gubernatorial Appointment

Arkansas Supreme Court seal reading Supreme Court of Arkansas, Est. 1836

Arkansas Supreme Court Associate Justice Barbara Webb has been recovering from a serious head injury since May 6, 2026. The 69-year-old jurist slipped and struck her head on her kitchen’s wood floor. At the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, she underwent surgery. before relocating to a Houston facility for physical, occupational and speech therapy.

The injury, and the physical, occupational and speech therapy that accompany brain injury recovery, have kept Webb off the bench for months, leaving the seven-member court a justice short. Because at least four justices must concur to decide a case, her absence raised the risk of tie votes and stalled rulings. This was of particular concern now, as high-profile disputes over abortion, school vouchers and executions are advancing toward the fall term.

To fill the gap, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders appointed attorney Cory Cox as special justice, a temporary replacement, on August 19, 2026. Cox shares Webb’s conservative outlook, thereby preserving the court’s balance. “As we pray for Justice Webb’s recovery, I know Cory has the character and work ethic to serve on the Court,” Sanders said.

Cook Brainfood With the Right Pan

Fried egg with colorful sautéed vegetables in a skillet

Every time you fry an egg or sauté a vegetable, the nonstick pan’s coating exposes you to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAs). In fact, these “forever chemicals” reportedly are detectable in more than 99% of people. Research increasingly ties this seemingly inescapable PFA injection increasingly ties them to neurological risk.

A 2026 University of Miami study in Environmental Research report on the findings of this study drew wide attention last month, July 2026: Higher blood levels of the PFAS compound PFHxS were associated with roughly 53% greater odds of multiple sclerosis, climbing to about 56% in women, with the most-exposed participants more than 3.5 times as likely to have MS. MS is a widely known possible consequence of brain injury. [Scientists caution, though, that this evidence is associational, not proof of cause.]  Animal studies have provided further evidence that PFAS can build up in the brain tissue and disrupt learning and memory.

Irrespective of these concerns, nonstick pans remain valuable, as they make it easier to cook low-oil foods like eggs, salmon, walnuts, and leafy greens that nourish the brain. So, to protect yourself, recommendations include: (1) avoid overheating pans, (2) never preheat pens empty, (3) ventilate your kitchen, (4) use wood or silicone utensils, and (5) replace scratched or pre-2015 pans.

NYT Reports “At Least 1 in 4 N.F.L. Players Gets Brain Disease”

A New York Times article published yesterday, August 25, 2026, focuses on a study published this week in BMJ: at least one in four former N.F.L. players who died between 2016 and 2021 had chronic traumatic encephalopathy. While The Times’ headline, Study’s Alarming Finding: At Least 1 in 4 N.F.L. Players Gets Brain Disease, captures the reader, it and the study itself omit an even grimmer finding: it appears that only about approximately a quarter of the 878 players who died had their brains examined. The real risk for CTE could be almost one hundred percent.

Worn navy football helmet with number 24 on a wooden bench

CTE comes from the cumulative force of repeated head impacts. (No tackle football position is safe, but low-contact positions like punters and kickers are the safest, while linemen absorb thousands of blows.) Roughly 60% of the players found with CTE had dementia and severe impairment, including an inability to feed or groom themselves.

This isn’t a call to ban tackle football. But public universities, however lucrative their football programs may be, are taxpayer-supported government institutions. Perhaps lawmakers should at least weigh the benefits and drawbacks of the sport on college campuses before federal funds are provided.

Pentagon Started Tracking Blast Injuries Then Ran Out of People

The Department of Defense launched brain-health monitoring for troops exposed to weapons blasts. However, a federal watchdog report released August 18, 2026 found that the DoD lacks the staff, technology, and funding to fully deliver on it.

Government Accountability Office building at 441 G Street NW with American flags

The DoD is highly aware, and the US Government Accountability Office report GAO-26-107829 warns, that firing certain weapons exposes service members to blast overpressure waves, which “may cause problems such as headaches, memory loss, or traumatic brain injury.” As with similar brain injuries, these waves can then travel through the skull and cause micro-injuries in the brain. (In fiscal 2025, 198,161 recruits completed baseline cognitive assessments, and 86% of high-risk personnel were screened, though the Navy lagged at only 59%.) Additionally, the GAO recognizes that a shortage of industrial hygienists remains the “primary barrier” to tracking exposures.

Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs Keith Bass agreed with both GAO recommendations, noting DoD “estimates it will complete the actions for both recommendations by December 2026.”