MCV students to participate in Benefit for the Brain

Charles Couch
Staff Reporter

The Brain Injury Association of Virginia is teaming up with VCU Occupational Therapy students to spread student awareness of the risk of brain injury and raise funds for the association.

The association will hold the Benefit for the Brain, a fundraising concert the proceeds of which will go to the BIAV, Saturday at the Camel. Many members of the bands performing are students in VCU’s MSOT Program, said a student and musician John Moosa.

“I think the key is to raise awareness,” Moosa said. “We’re trying to spread to message to a different population and let people know that [the BIAV] is out there.”

The Center for Disease Control estimates that 28,000 Virginians suffer from brain injury each year. While the number one demographic for these injuries are the elderly, the second largest group to suffer brain injuries are high school and college-aged people due to bicycle accidents, car accidents and sports-related injuries, said VCU OT Professor and BAIV Broad President Tony Gentry.

About seven years ago, young people were the number one demographic plagued by brain injury, Gentry added.

“There’s so many more elderly people now than there use to be, but that doesn’t mean there are any less number of teenagers getting conked on the head either,” Gentry said. “It’s a good idea for them to get aware of it and also to know what resources are there if it happens to them or a loved one.”

The BIAV, like many other organizations and nonprofits, has had to tighten its state-funded budget over the last few years due to economic recession, Genty said. As president, Gentry has charged the association with brainstorming new creative ways to raise funds.

Gentry said the BAIV is taking its first step in implementing such creative ideas with the benefit concert, which he has been planning since last summer.

While the benefit’s primary goal is to inform younger people of the BIAV, the funds accumulated from the event will go toward BIAV brain injury prevention and education initiatives as well as scholarships for brain injury survivors to Camp Bruce McCoy, a summer camp in Chesapeake.

Bruce McCoy operates similarly to most summer camps offering activities such as swimming and canoeing, but, during two weeks of the summer, the camp is open to survivors of brain injuries and offers them occupational and physical therapists volunteers to help with their daily routine and care, Gentry said.

“It’s a camp like any other, with this extra level of support to the degree that each camper needs it,” Gentry said. Every year, the BIAV tries to give out five to ten full or partial scholarships to brain injury survivors who can’t afford to attend the camp.

“My hope is that this fundraiser will help replenish that fund as well so that we can offer more scholarships this summer,” Gentry said.