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Prisoner or Patient?

Are Correctional Facilities Adequately Caring for the Health of Their Inmates? According to the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), incarcerated individuals are “disproportionately affected by chronic health conditions, mental illness, and substance abuse. However, they tend to receive inadequate healthcare before, during, and after incarceration or detention, further exacerbating their disadvantage.” As of 2016, Read More...

Medically Conscious but Legally Unconscious?

Conscious or Unconscious? Can someone be medically conscious but considered legally unconscious? What an interesting conundrum! According to the Oxford Dictionary, “unconsciousness is the state of being unconscious or the state of being uninformed or unaware” and “automatism is the performance of actions without conscious thought or intention, involuntary” (Oxford English Dictionary, 2021). Even in Read More...

Effect of Brain Damage on Personality

How can brain damage be used to create reasonable doubt? In 1990, a 40-year-old schoolteacher suddenly began using prostitutes and making inappropriate advances to his stepdaughter. The courts ordered him to go to Sexaholics Anonymous or go to prison. He failed the program because he kept asking people for sex. The hospital found a large Read More...

Traumatic Brain Injury or Mental Illness?

TBI and Mental Illness What if a defendant commits a crime because of being affected by either an acute brain injury or an acquired or inherited brain disease? This is called the “brain defense.” In criminal cases, defense attorneys are increasingly using clinical evidence of brain injury to either establish their client’s innocence or mitigate Read More...

Anxiety: When Benzo’s Attack

Did you Know? Anxiety disorders develop from risk factors such as genetics, brain chemistry life events and personality. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the United States. Approximately 40 million adults age 18 and older, are affected each year. This equates to about 18.1% of the United States population. Anxiety disorders are Read More...