Brain Injury Safety
Brain Injury Safety
Every March, Brain Injury Awareness Month spotlights a risk that hits older adults hardest of all: falls that lead to lasting brain injury. Here's what families can do next.
Every March, Brain Injury Awareness Month asks families to look closely at a risk that's easy to overlook until it happens: brain injury in older adults. The Brain Injury Association of America (BIAA) reports that at least 5.3 million Americans — roughly one in every 60 people — live with a disability related to traumatic brain injury. Older adults carry an outsized share of that burden, mainly because falls are the leading cause of brain injury in this age group. Someone in the U.S. sustains a brain injury every nine seconds. For families supporting an aging parent or spouse, understanding why this happens, how it's often missed, and what concrete prevention steps actually work can make the difference between a scare and a life-altering event.
Falls are the top cause of brain injury in older adults, and symptoms are often mistaken for dementia. Fall-proofing the home, reviewing medications, and using assistive devices meaningfully cut the risk.
Brain Injury Awareness Month happens every March, and it exists because brain injury is still widely misunderstood as something that mainly affects athletes or young people in car accidents. BIAA's research tells a different story: with 5.3 million Americans living with a TBI-related disability, this is a large and often invisible population, and older adults make up a significant share of it.
BIAA's current campaign, #MoreThanMyBrainInjury, was built specifically to push back on that narrow perception. Its goals are to treat brain injury as a chronic condition rather than a single event, reduce the stigma surrounding it, highlight how diverse the affected community actually is, and improve the support systems available to survivors and the families caring for them.
For a family managing an aging loved one's care, this awareness matters practically, not just symbolically. Recognizing brain injury as a real and common risk — rather than a rare, freak occurrence — is what motivates the kind of proactive home and medical safety planning that actually prevents it.
The terminology around brain injury can be confusing, but the distinction matters for how families think about risk. An Acquired Brain Injury (ABI) is any brain injury that occurs after birth — it can be degenerative or caused by trauma at birth. A Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is one specific type of ABI, caused by an external force striking or penetrating the brain.
The scale of this is larger than most people assume. More than 3.6 million people sustain an ABI every year, and at least 2.8 million of those are specifically TBIs. That means TBIs make up the large majority of acquired brain injuries nationally, and falls are consistently one of the leading external forces behind them, alongside forceful impacts and injuries from sharp objects.
Knowing this distinction helps families ask better questions after any fall or head impact — not just 'is there a cut or bruise,' but 'could this be a traumatic brain injury,' even when there's no obvious external wound.
According to the CDC, older adults are more likely than any other age group to be hospitalized and to die from a TBI. This isn't because older adults take more physical risks — it's largely because falls become more common and more dangerous with age, and the body has less resilience to recover from head trauma when it occurs.
Falls are the dominant cause cited in the source research, alongside forceful impacts to the head. Because older adults are already at higher fall risk due to balance changes, vision changes, medication side effects, and home environment hazards, that same vulnerability translates directly into elevated brain injury risk.
This connection is exactly why fall prevention and brain injury prevention aren't separate conversations for older adults — they're the same conversation. Reducing fall risk is, in practice, the primary lever families have for reducing brain injury risk in an aging loved one.
| Risk Area | Action Step | Who to Involve |
|---|---|---|
| Medications | Review all prescriptions for dizziness or balance side effects | Doctor or pharmacist |
| Home hazards | Remove throw rugs and improve lighting in walkways | Family or caregiver |
| Mobility support | Install grab bars, handrails, and a raised toilet seat | Occupational therapist |
| Footwear | Replace slippers with sensible, supportive shoes | Individual and caregiver |
One of the more concerning facts from the CDC's research is that TBIs are frequently missed or misdiagnosed in older adults. That's because the symptoms of a brain injury — confusion, memory lapses, mood changes, disorientation — can look almost identical to symptoms of dementia or other common conditions affecting older adults.
This overlap means a fall that seems minor on the surface, without visible injury, can still cause a brain injury that goes unrecognized for weeks or months. A family might attribute new confusion or forgetfulness to 'normal aging' or an existing cognitive condition rather than connecting it back to a recent fall.
Because of this, any fall involving a hit to the head — even one that seems mild — deserves a conversation with a doctor, and families should mention the fall specifically rather than only describing new symptoms in isolation.
Since falls are the primary driver of brain injury in older adults, the prevention tips that matter most are fall-prevention tips. The source guidance highlights several specific, doable actions: reviewing medications regularly with a doctor, since some drugs affect balance or alertness, and removing home hazards like throw rugs that are easy to trip over.
Lighting matters too — well-lit living spaces help older adults see and avoid tripping hazards, especially at night. Assistive devices like handrails, grab bars, and raised toilet seats provide physical support in the exact spots where falls are most likely, particularly bathrooms and stairways.
Two more factors round out the list: staying as physically active as possible, since strength and balance directly reduce fall risk, and wearing sensible, supportive shoes rather than loose slippers or worn-out footwear that can catch or slide.
Fall and brain injury prevention isn't a task for one person to handle alone. The source material is explicit that individuals, caregivers, and medical professionals all have a role — a doctor evaluates medications and health conditions, a caregiver can assess and adjust the home environment, and the older adult themselves benefits from staying engaged in decisions about their own safety.
This team approach matters because no single person sees the whole picture. A physician may not know that a rug in the hallway has become a trip hazard, and a family member may not realize a new prescription increases dizziness. Regular, honest conversations between all three groups close those gaps.
Organizations like BIAA and CarePatrol provide structured checklists and fact sheets specifically so families don't have to build a prevention plan from scratch — using an established resource is often faster and more thorough than improvising.
Falls are the leading cause of brain injury in older adults, and symptoms often mimic dementia, making them easy to miss. Reviewing medications, removing home hazards, and staying active are the most effective, evidence-backed prevention steps families can take today.
Brain injury in older adults is far more common than most families realize, with 5.3 million Americans currently living with a TBI-related disability and falls as the leading cause. Because symptoms can mimic dementia, injuries are often missed until they've caused lasting harm. The encouraging news is that the prevention steps are concrete and achievable: a medication review, a hazard sweep through the home, better lighting, assistive devices in bathrooms and stairways, staying active, and sensible footwear. None of these require major expense or expertise — they require attention and follow-through from the whole care team, including the older adult, family caregivers, and the physician.
Seek medical evaluation immediately after any fall or head impact involving loss of consciousness, vomiting, worsening headache, unequal pupils, or slurred speech. Even without these signs, new confusion, memory changes, or mood shifts in the days after a fall warrant a prompt doctor visit, since TBI symptoms are frequently mistaken for unrelated cognitive decline.