Who looks after the interest of the Brain Injured Community? We the Brain Injured Community has felt that nobody know about us or look out for our interests.

For this reason the SA National Lobby Group for People with Acquired Brain Injuries (Brain Injury Group [BIG]) has been formed. Half the Committee Members of BIG are people who suffered brain injuries and the other half is presented by family members and professionals actively involved with the brain-injured community.

A technical definition of an Acquired Brain Injury: It is the impairment of normal brain function due to a neurological insult, such as: open or closed head injury (traumatic brain injury or TBI), select cerebral vascular lesions (i.e. aneurysm, haemorrhage, brain stem stroke), hypoxic intracranial tumour, and select neurological diseases (i.e. encephalopathy).

The overall aim of BIG is to create a better future for the brain injured, their families and support groups. Specific objectives are:

1. To inform the general public, the brain injured community and other institutions about brain injuries, support groups and BIG;
2. To establish more support groups for the brain injured;
3. To establish a database of people that work with the brain injured;
4. To look at the need for training of caregivers, the public, students as well as professionals, regarding how to communicate and interact with the brain injured;
5. To create a context of social interaction;
6. To look at ways and means to create employment for the brain injured. This includes the brain injured who will be able to work in the open labour market, as well as for the brain injured that won’t be able to work in the open labour markets;
7. To focus on vocational and medical rehabilitation, and
8. To raise funds and sponsorship to help achieve the organisation’s objectives.