November 5, 2025 by Angela

Protecting a Lifeline: Why Your Holiday Gift Matters for Brain Injury Survivors in Marin & the San Francisco Bay Area

When someone experiences a stroke, concussion, or traumatic brain injury, life changes in an instant. What comes after — recovery, emotional health, rebuilding skills, reconnecting with community — can be a long journey that requires specialized support. Yet in Marin County and the greater San Francisco Bay Area, there is only one nonprofit dedicated solely to helping people navigate life after brain injury: Schurig Center for Brain Injury Recovery.

As the holiday season approaches, we’re inviting caring community members like you to help protect this vital resource and ensure no survivor has to face recovery alone.

A Unique Community Resource Worth Protecting

For more than 40 years, Schurig Center has served as a lifeline for hundreds of people every year. We offer therapeutic classes, support groups, resource referral assistance, and programs that help survivors regain skills, independence, and hope. Families also receive brain injury education, support, and respite.

Unlike medical programs or other charitable organizations, our services are not covered by insurance and we do not receive federal funding. Instead, over 80% of the support needed to keep our doors open comes from caring donors and charitable foundations.

This means that your generosity directly sustains our mission.

Why Your Donation Matters This Holiday Season

Your gift makes a real and immediate difference. When you donate to Schurig Center, you help:

Fill critical gaps in care for survivors who have nowhere else to turn.
Ensure recovery programs remain affordable, especially for the 70% of our clients who are low-income.
Support more than 600 individuals and family caregivers this year with continued rehabilitation, resource referral assistance, brain injury education, and support groups.
Protect the only nonprofit brain injury recovery resource in Marin and the Bay Area.

Every dollar extends a hand of compassion to someone rebuilding their life.

Holiday Giving: A Powerful Way to Change Lives

During this time of year, many people look for meaningful ways to give back locally. By choosing Schurig Center, you’re not just giving a donation — you’re giving healing, stability, and new possibilities to survivors in your own community.

Imagine helping someone speak clearly again after a stroke. Supporting a parent recovering from a concussion so they can return to work. Giving a caregiver a rare moment of relief and connection.

This is what your holiday gift makes possible.

Join Us in Strengthening the Future of Brain Injury Recovery

As need for our programs continues, your support ensures this unique community resource remains strong – not just for today, but for the future.

If you believe every person deserves the chance to heal and rebuild their life, we invite you to make a holiday donation today.

Your generosity protects hope. Your compassion fuels healing.

Thank you for supporting brain injury survivors and families when they need it most.

December 22, 2023 by Angela

Why Your Support Matters

A Special Message from Dr. Gary Abrams

photo of Dr. Abrams I am a Professor of Neurology at the University of California San Francisco and have worked in the neuro-recovery field for 40 years. I am delighted to serve as a volunteer member of Schurig Center’s Board of Directors because their programs play an essential role in helping people heal and fill gaps in the continuum of our health care system.

As many of you may know, our health care system provides only limited support for patients beyond the early rehabilitation phase of treatment after a traumatic brain injury, concussion, stroke, and other types of brain injury. However, the journey to reaching one’s full potential is often a prolonged process and most effective with access to continued support and community re-integration.

With your generosity, this is where Schurig Center helps.

The enriched environment of Schurig Center picks up where health care leaves off by providing long-term restorative therapies, personal growth activities, and opportunities for social engagement. I have long recognized these are critical components for optimal recovery, but they are often difficult to access in our community.

Without a place like Schurig Center, many people end up isolated, depressed, declining in their abilities and health, and potentially, back in the hospital system.

The need for organizations like Schurig Center cannot be over emphasized.

Schurig Center is the only place I know of that helps address this need by offering an array of supportive “whole person” services and a community that cares for both survivors and their families. Staff work with a talented group of medical advisors who consult on program design to ensure services are high quality and effective.

I’m reaching out to you today because it’s critical for the center to have support from community members, like you and I, to carry forth its mission. Schurig Center is a nonprofit that does not receive medical reimbursements or federal funding.

I can’t stress enough how much your giving matters. Through your generosity, you have the power to help ensure your fellow community members living with a brain injury don’t fall through the cracks in our health care system. Please join me in helping to ensure this vital community resource continues to be available.

If you are in a position to help, please donate today and give as generously as you can.

On behalf of the people whose lives your caring touches, thank you. I can assure you your gift will be used wisely and will go far in helping hundreds of people this year.

Sincerely,

Dr. Gary Abrams, MD
Schurig Center Board of Directors
Professor of Neurology, UCSF

July 6, 2021 by Angela

Schurig Center’s Board President Honored with Picnic Table in Larkspur

National Association of Realtors^® singled out Schurig Center’s volunteer Board President Kim Strub as one of their national Good Neighbor Award recipients in 2019 and provided a $20,000 grant for the organization at that time in partnership with Wells Fargo Foundation. They also decided to dedicate a picnic table to her in recognition of her decade-plus of volunteer service to Schurig Center. The NAR Good Neighbor Awards recognize REALTORS who make extraordinary commitments to improving the quality of life in their communities.

The picnic table dedicated to Kim and Schurig Center is located on the walking path along Corte Madera Creek by Bon Air Center in Larkspur. The public is invited to enjoy the table. An inaugural picnic was held at the new picnic table in June 2021. In attendance from the Schurig Center were Executive Director Patricia Gill and Board member and Larkspur city councilmember, Catherine Way.

“I’m thrilled that the work of Schurig Center continues to be recognized for the important role we play in helping individuals and families rehabilitate after traumatic brain injuries. The center looks forward to reopening our doors to in-person classes in the fall, while our remote support continues to be offered,” said Strub. “We are hopeful that the picnic table can be enjoyed by the public and brings awareness to the need for the services we provide in our local community.”

Since the organization’s founding in 1985, Schurig Center’s mission has been powered by community support. We are deeply grateful for the loyal support of our community of friends, like Kim, who have been helping us improve lives and abilities for over 35 years.

If you’d like to join us in celebrating Kim’s service to the community, we hope you’ll consider making a donation to Schurig Center in her honor today.

Congrats, Kim!