Portland Brain Injury Lawyer, Dr. Aaron DeShaw, recently lectured at the 2013 Annual Conference of the Brain Injury Alliance of Oregon. DeShaw is known for handling complex and catastrophic injury cases as a trial lawyer, most notably traumatic brain injury cases. He is one of a small number of trial lawyers in the country who belong to the Traumatic Brain Injury Litigation Group of the American Association for Justice.
DeShaw has been a regular lecturer for the Brain Injury Alliance of Oregon at their annual convention. This year, he lectured for brain injury doctors and lawyers on advanced brain imaging, including HDFT, MEG, DTI / tractography, 3T MRI, PET, SPECT, CSF flow studies, and others. His lecture showed how standard resolution MRIs and CTs almost always are negative, despite life-changing brain injuries. He also showed groundbreaking research being performed in universities, aimed at showing where certain types of memories are stored in the brain.
DeShaw also briefly covered the importance of high quality (and often very expensive) neuropsychological assessment to uncover brain deficits in someone who was of high IQ prior to an injury, and how average testing scores post-injury reflect a significant change from that person’s pre-injury capacity. Lastly, he covered how insurance neuropsychologists who work for the defense often will mislead the jury about the extent of injuries.
Dr. DeShaw was pleased to be able to lecture with several of the leading brain injury doctors in Oregon, including Dr. James Chesnutt - head of the Traumatic Brain Injury Team at OHSU, and one of the world’s leading neuropsychologists, Muriel Lezak Ph.D. Lezak is best known as the author of what is considered “the Bible” of neuropsychology, Neuropsychological Assessment. One of Dr. DeShaw’s past cases is featured as a case study in the 5th Edition of the text.
Dr. DeShaw’s interests in neurology and the brain started during his Doctorate of Chiropractic degree program, which required over 4000 hours of classroom instruction and clinical rounds, including over 700 hours of neurology, neuroanatomy, neurophysiology and diagnosis of the brain and nervous system. DeShaw retired as a health care provider in 2000.