The husband of a brain injury victim hopes the legislature gives victims a chance to function again
Senator Bill Stouffer of Napton says he entered an entirely different world four years ago when his wife suffered a traumatic brain injury. While she was being treated, the Stouffers got to know a high school girl who was left in a near-vegetative state for several months. But early intervention with rehabilitative services helped get her back to the point where she could function as a teenager.
Depending on the injury, he says, a person often has to be retrained to do even the most routine things such as tying shoestrings or putting groceries into cabinets.
Stouffer wants the legislature to pass his bill adding comprehensive day rehabilitation services to the Medicaid program now called Missouri Healthnet.
He says injured people get a little outpatient therapy from a hospital but that service doesn’t last very long and without Medicaid funding, many families can’t afford continued rehabilitative services that could restore victims to a useful life.
"It’s the right thing to do. It’s the human thing to do," he has told a Senate Committee. The committee has taken no action although it held the hearing on Stouffer’s bill almost two weeks ago.
Download Bob Priddy’s story (:59 mp3)
