Joyce Davis

The Brain Injury Association of South Carolina was founded in 1998. We are a nonprofit organization dedicated to creating a better future through brain injury prevention, research, education, and advocacy, while supporting individuals and families affected by brain injury across our state.

We provide support through education, a helpline, resource facilitation, information and referrals, peer support, support groups, and advocacy.

I’m here today to ask: What’s in a name?

Last summer, the South Carolina General Assembly passed legislation merging three state agencies into one department: the South Carolina Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities. Under this new department, the former Department of Disabilities and Special Needs became the Office of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.

As representatives of the Brain Injury Association of South Carolina and the Spinal Cord Injury Association, we support bringing the departments together.

Our concern is that the new name does not clearly include people with spinal cord injury or traumatic brain injury.

Many of the people we serve receive Head and Spinal Cord Injury case management, HASCI Medicaid Waiver services, and day program supports.

People with spinal cord injuries do not necessarily fall under the term “intellectual or developmental disabilities,” and people who sustain a traumatic brain injury later in life may not identify themselves that way either.

When the language used by a system does not clearly reflect the people it serves, confusion can follow.

Current HASCI recipients may wonder whether they are still eligible for services. People who are newly living with a traumatic brain injury or spinal cord injury may not realize that the department is a place where they can seek help.

That is why advocates have an important role to play.

We will continue educating individuals, families, providers, and communities and helping connect people with traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury to the services for which they may qualify.

We ask other advocates to do the same.

People with TBI and SCI can still be served through this system, even when the name itself does not make that clear.

Through grassroots advocacy, we can help people find the services they need.

Maybe in the future, we can also help policymakers better understand that different disabilities have different experiences, needs, and identities, and that those differences matter.

Until then, we have to keep educating our communities about what is not in a name.