Team Infidel
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Arizona Daily Star (Tucson)
May 11, 2008 By The Orlando Sentinel
ORLANDO, Fla. — Sgt. David Kinney realized he had a problem when he struggled to read the e-mails his wife sent him in Afghanistan.
He suffered headaches, and his vision grew steadily worse. Before long, the military shipped him home to DeLand, Fla. Now he's considered legally blind.
"I didn't get blown up or knocked out, or have a big piece of my head missing like some of these guys," said Kinney, who served in Orlando's 2nd Battalion, 124th Infantry Regiment of the Florida National Guard. "You didn't see it coming."
Kinney, 46, is among an increasing number of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans losing their eyesight not because of bullet or bomb wounds but in what doctors suspect is a delayed reaction to the constant pounding of nearby explosives.
His eyes aren't the problem. His brain is.
Studies conducted by the military have estimated that up to 20 percent of the 1.7 million troops who have served and returned from Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from mild traumatic brain injury, most often as a result of roadside bombs, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars.
Bill Wilson, a blindness-rehabilitation specialist at the Orlando VA Medical Center, sees a coming wave of woe.
"We won't know for months," he said. "We can see the individuals and they may be perfectly fine, and then down the line they have problems." No one knows how many of the veterans may eventually be blind or have to deal with other vision problems, but research suggests there could be thousands.
The military is just beginning to study the problem, said Gregory Goodrich, supervisory research psychologist and coordinator of the optometry-research fellowship at the Department of Veterans Affairs' Palo Alto (Calif.) Healthcare System. Preliminary results from a pilot study suggested that as many as 70 percent of severely wounded soldiers treated for traumatic brain injuries also complain of double vision, difficulties in reading, blindness and other vision problems.
At first Kinney's doctors thought he'd had a stroke. Later, he learned he had suffered mild Traumatic Brain Injury, or TBI, and an Orlando neurologist eventually blamed his condition on exposure to bombs.
In Afghanistan, part of Kinney's job had been to help blow up old Soviet munitions. He earlier had served in Iraq, where he often felt the concussive effects of roadside bombs.
"It was like riding around in a car with kids and their boomboxes," Kinney said of his time in Iraq. "It's a constant boom-boom-boom. It would shake the ground, crack windows and knock plaster off the wall."
Experts say brain injuries such as Kinney's are often difficult to detect. Even more challenging is making the connection between TBI and blindness. It's so early in the research that's there been little success in developing cures or treatments.
"Even if the eyes are working perfectly, brain injuries can lead to blindness," said Glenn Cockerham, chief of ophthalmology at the VA Palo Alto.
Certain parts of the brain, such as the occipital lobe, the region of the brain that controls vision, can take a pounding from blast shock waves. Kinney suffered occipital-lobe damage.
Preliminary research in a small study by Cockerham found 26 percent of soldiers injured in blasts had severe visual impairment, including blindness.
Kinney said the blasts he survived were "nothing special. We knew when explosions went off, we were being protected," he said of his body armor.
But the armor, even though it included a helmet, didn't protect the vision center of his brain.
"I volunteered for the Army, I volunteered for the mission, I know what happens and I know what decisions I made," he said. "I'm not bitter."
Still, he finds his condition "aggravating." For a soldier-husband used to providing and protecting, it has meant tension-filled moments with his wife, Antonia, 43.
"Something falls, and I'll try to pick it up and plow right into her," he said. His wife says she has taken over more of the job of keeping the household.
The military is gearing up to offer more help to Kinney and other soldiers losing their sight.
This year, the Veterans Health Administration is spending $40 million to add 55 outpatient vision-rehabilitation clinics nationwide and to increase staff at existing facilities, said James Orcutt, national program director of ophthalmology for the VA.
Kinney will spend four to six weeks at the Southeastern Blind Rehabilitation Center in Birmingham, Ala. There he'll learn how to live with his blindness, building upon what he's using at home.
May 11, 2008 By The Orlando Sentinel
ORLANDO, Fla. — Sgt. David Kinney realized he had a problem when he struggled to read the e-mails his wife sent him in Afghanistan.
He suffered headaches, and his vision grew steadily worse. Before long, the military shipped him home to DeLand, Fla. Now he's considered legally blind.
"I didn't get blown up or knocked out, or have a big piece of my head missing like some of these guys," said Kinney, who served in Orlando's 2nd Battalion, 124th Infantry Regiment of the Florida National Guard. "You didn't see it coming."
Kinney, 46, is among an increasing number of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans losing their eyesight not because of bullet or bomb wounds but in what doctors suspect is a delayed reaction to the constant pounding of nearby explosives.
His eyes aren't the problem. His brain is.
Studies conducted by the military have estimated that up to 20 percent of the 1.7 million troops who have served and returned from Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from mild traumatic brain injury, most often as a result of roadside bombs, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars.
Bill Wilson, a blindness-rehabilitation specialist at the Orlando VA Medical Center, sees a coming wave of woe.
"We won't know for months," he said. "We can see the individuals and they may be perfectly fine, and then down the line they have problems." No one knows how many of the veterans may eventually be blind or have to deal with other vision problems, but research suggests there could be thousands.
The military is just beginning to study the problem, said Gregory Goodrich, supervisory research psychologist and coordinator of the optometry-research fellowship at the Department of Veterans Affairs' Palo Alto (Calif.) Healthcare System. Preliminary results from a pilot study suggested that as many as 70 percent of severely wounded soldiers treated for traumatic brain injuries also complain of double vision, difficulties in reading, blindness and other vision problems.
At first Kinney's doctors thought he'd had a stroke. Later, he learned he had suffered mild Traumatic Brain Injury, or TBI, and an Orlando neurologist eventually blamed his condition on exposure to bombs.
In Afghanistan, part of Kinney's job had been to help blow up old Soviet munitions. He earlier had served in Iraq, where he often felt the concussive effects of roadside bombs.
"It was like riding around in a car with kids and their boomboxes," Kinney said of his time in Iraq. "It's a constant boom-boom-boom. It would shake the ground, crack windows and knock plaster off the wall."
Experts say brain injuries such as Kinney's are often difficult to detect. Even more challenging is making the connection between TBI and blindness. It's so early in the research that's there been little success in developing cures or treatments.
"Even if the eyes are working perfectly, brain injuries can lead to blindness," said Glenn Cockerham, chief of ophthalmology at the VA Palo Alto.
Certain parts of the brain, such as the occipital lobe, the region of the brain that controls vision, can take a pounding from blast shock waves. Kinney suffered occipital-lobe damage.
Preliminary research in a small study by Cockerham found 26 percent of soldiers injured in blasts had severe visual impairment, including blindness.
Kinney said the blasts he survived were "nothing special. We knew when explosions went off, we were being protected," he said of his body armor.
But the armor, even though it included a helmet, didn't protect the vision center of his brain.
"I volunteered for the Army, I volunteered for the mission, I know what happens and I know what decisions I made," he said. "I'm not bitter."
Still, he finds his condition "aggravating." For a soldier-husband used to providing and protecting, it has meant tension-filled moments with his wife, Antonia, 43.
"Something falls, and I'll try to pick it up and plow right into her," he said. His wife says she has taken over more of the job of keeping the household.
The military is gearing up to offer more help to Kinney and other soldiers losing their sight.
This year, the Veterans Health Administration is spending $40 million to add 55 outpatient vision-rehabilitation clinics nationwide and to increase staff at existing facilities, said James Orcutt, national program director of ophthalmology for the VA.
Kinney will spend four to six weeks at the Southeastern Blind Rehabilitation Center in Birmingham, Ala. There he'll learn how to live with his blindness, building upon what he's using at home.