Dr. Swank received her BA and MA from Wichita State University and the PhD from the University of Kansas. She taught for several years at the University of Virginia, prior to returning to Wichita State, as Chairperson of the Department of Communicative Disorders and Sciences. Dr. Swank is a nationally recognized speaker on dyslexia, oral and written language acquisition and disorders across the life span. Since moving to Austin, Dr. Swank has lectured at Texas State University in San Marcos. Dr. Swank has worked with Traumatic Brain Injury in Kansas, Virginia, and Texas.

Services:

Cognitive Rehabilitation (5-0020) focus on development of cognitive skills including the ability to perceive, recognize, conceive, judge, imagine and reason lost or altered as a result of neurological damage.

Individualized Treatment Plan (5-0030) providing long-term and short-term goals and objectives; the treatment modalities to be used in achieving these goals and objectives; the individual(s) responsible for each treatment modality; the target date by which each goal and objective is to be achieved; and the discharge plan.

Post-Acute Brain Injury (5-0050) advanced rehabilitation services provided through an interdisciplinary team based on an assessment of the individual’s cognitive deficits. The goal of treatment is to achieve functional changes in a client with brain injury by reinforcing, strengthening, or re-establishing previously learned patterns of behavior or establishing new patterns of cognitive activity or compensatory mechanisms. Specific services may include, but are not limited to: (1) cognitive rehabilitation services, (2) behavior management, and (3) the development of coping skills and compensatory strategies.

Assessment & Therapy Approaches:

Client, family and community centered
Multi-discipline & collaborative
Multi-modality including use of The Brain Wave Series; Burns Brief Inventory of Communication and Cognition (Right Hemisphere, Left Hemisphere, and Complex Neuropathology)
Computerized activities to increase attention, memory, accuracy, problem solving & executive functioning skills

Traumatic Brain Injury Therapy Programs:

Our goal is to train or retrain the brain to gain or regain competence in the following areas utilizing the Brainwave-R approach:

Attention - develop focused, sustained, selective, and alternating (multi-tasking) attention skills in order to optimize arousal and alertness levels.

Visual Processing - develop more accurate saccadic eye movements, visual scanning skills, visual attention, figure-ground discrimination, pattern recognition, visual memory, and the ability to mentally manipulate visual information and reinforce the attention skills.

Information Processing - develop ordered, sequenced thinking skills and the ability to work more quickly, under time constraints, and with more complex information. These skills are needed to transition back to academics and/or career.

Memory - teach the client about memory processes and emphasize the use of strategies to compensate for memory problems.

Executive Functions - teaches the client about executive functions and strategies that can be used to compensate for deficits in this area, and provides a choice of projects for the client to organize, plan, and execute using the strategies to transition to school, job and community.

How to Manage Concussions in Sports

Grade 1 Concussion - No loss of consciousness; mental confusion and incoherent thought resolves in 15 minutes.

1. Remove from contest.
2. Examine immediately and at 5 minute intervals for mental Status.
3. May return to contest within 15 minutes if mental status appears clear & thinking is coherent.

Grade 2 Concussion - No loss of consciousness; mental confusion and incoherent thought does not resolves in 15 minutes.

1. Remove from contest and disallow return for that day.
2. Examine on site frequently for signs of evolving intracranial pathology.
3. A trained person should reexamine the athlete the following day.
4. A physician should perform a neurologic examination to clear the athlete for return to play after 0ne full asymptomatic week at rest & with exertion.

Grade 3 Concussion - Any loss of consciousness brief (seconds) or prolonged (minutes)

1. Transport by ambulance to the nearest emergency room, and if cervical concerns, immobilize neck and spine areas.
2. Thorough neurologic examination, care is fully transferred to a medical doctor, no play until release from a medical doctor.