|Blast injuries are not confined to soldiers in combat overseas.
In April 1995, the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City was
nearly destroyed in the heart of the city after a massive bomb
exploded. Photo credit: FEMA News photographer Each era is
associated with a unique pattern of wartime injuries. In this
century, a new and highly sophisticated pattern of missile
warfare exposes soldiers and civilian survivors of terrorist
attacks to explosions which cause strong air-pressure "blasts."
Multi-level injury from blast exposure, referred to as "blast
injury," may result in a constellation of impairments to body
organs and systems. The multiorgan/ multisystem involvement,
known as "polytrauma," adds significant complexity to the
medical and rehabilitation profile for individuals who survive
blast injury. Medical speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are
well-prepared to provide services to patients with traumatic
brain injury (TBI); aphasia; motor speech impairment; dysphagia;
oral, facial, oral-pharyngeal, na