Annual Seminar for Professionals

Save the Date! May 6, 2026

The Palace at Somerset Park, Somerset, NJ

BIANJ’s Annual Professional Seminar offers an educational and networking opportunity for professionals to gain knowledge of the latest research, best practices and effective strategies for working with individuals affected by brain injury. The knowledge level of the audience varies, including both new and experienced professionals.

The seminar is a full-day conference consisting of a keynote presentation followed by three workshop blocks with three presentations in each block. Lunch will be served and organization exhibitors and student poster presentations will also be included.

2026 Keynote Address

Unlocking Resilience: A New Hope for Well-being after Brain Injury

Dawn Neumann, PhD, FACRM

A brain injury (BI) can result in an array of sequelae that differ across individuals in terms of symptom type, severity, and persistence, as well as the degree of impact on daily functioning and participation. These include changes in cognition, communication, emotional functioning (emotion regulation, mood, psychological distress), behavior, interpersonal skills, headaches or other chronic pain, poor sleep, fatigue, and/ or physical limitations. Across all treating disciplines, understanding modifiable risk factors that influence function is critical to informing necessary screening and post-injury care to optimize recovery. Notably, an important factor known to influence the recovery of symptoms after a BI, including concussion, is resilience. But how can resilience be strengthened in individuals with brain injury? This keynote presentation will delve into a factor that has been overlooked in the BI population for far too long: alexithymia (impaired emotional insight). The presentation will cover clinical characteristics of alexithymia, why it is relevant to resilience and outcomes after BI, and share evidence that training offers hope for treating problems with alexithymia in people who have sustained a BI and can impact their resiliency and well-being. Recognizing and treating alexithymia has the potential to improve outcomes from concussion to severe BI.

Dawn Neumann, PhD, FACRM is a Research Scientist and Manager of Brain Injury Research at JFK Johnson Rehabilitation Institute. She has a PhD in Rehabilitation Science from SUNY Buffalo, NY and her MA in Psychology from Rutgers, NJ. Her research aims to advance the understanding and treatment of social cognition and emotion dysregulation deficits after traumatic brain injury. She serves on the Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation editorial review board, and is an active member of the American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine (ACRM), where she has been honored as Fellow for her contributions to the organization. She has received several awards for her research in brain injury from ACRM, including the Deborah Wilkerson Award, Mitchell Rosenthal Award, and the Joshua Cantor Scholar Award.