Justin Campbell

Justin Campbell is 14 years old and a student at Woodburn Junior High School.  He lives with his parents and his younger brother Andy, who is ten years old.

About three months ago, Justin was involved in an automobile crash, during which he sustained a brain injury.  The closed head injury caused him to be in a coma for about four hours.  He remained in the hospital for about one week before being transferred to an inpatient rehabilitation facility.  About a month after the crash, he returned to his family's home, where he continued his various therapies on an outpatient basis.

Now, Justin has returned to school.  Due to the fatigue that the brain injury causes, he attends for a shortened day.  Part of Justin's school day includes continued therapy and other special education services.  He works with an instructional assistant each afternoon to help him organize and plan for assignments.  He also receives help from a peer tutor and friends, who help him get from class to class.

Justin's brain injury has affected him in a variety of ways.  While the physical therapy he received earlier in the rehabilitation process has virtually eliminated the physical difficulties he experienced, it is likely that much of the injury's cognitive and emotional impact will be permanent.  While it is impossible to “cure” a brain injury, through continued rehabilitation and educational efforts, Justin will learn compensatory strategies to allow him to do many of the same things he did before his injury, although in a different way.

Some of the cognitive changes he has experienced are short-term memory loss, difficulty learning new information, impaired executive functioning (the ability to organize, plan, initiate, and terminate activities), occasional word-finding problems, and decreased attention abilities.  Emotional changes include lack of insight, inappropriate laughter, emotional lability, lack of emotional control, and difficulty tolerating chaotic situations.

Justin is a talented artist.  He has been painting as a hobby and taking extra-curricular art lessons since he was eight years old.  Since his brain injury, his art has become even more important to him.  Justin is glad to have an expressive outlet to deal with the feelings of loss, frustration, and anger that he has about his brain injury.  Before the injury, Justin had given some thought to what he wanted to do when he is older, but not a lot.  Now, he's fairly certain that his future career will be related to his art.  Whatever his long term goals, Justin knows that right now, it is important for him to focus on some short term goals, like mastering his compensatory strategies, learning what situations cause him problems, and developing stamina to extend his school day.

Justin is the featured character in The Kids on the Block program on brain injury.