Established in 1950 by the U. S. Congress as the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Blindness to help handle the casualties of World War II, NINDS grew along with the NIH.

[citation needed] The NINDS was created in 1950 to study and treat the neurological and psychiatric casualties of World War II.

[4] In addition, 1.7 million American men had been rejected for military service due to a neuropsychiatric condition or learning disorder.

During WWII, all of the administrative positions of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology held by the US armed services were filled by psychiatrists.

[6] After the war, a survey by the Veteran's Administration of the members of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology found that 48 were neurologists and 456 were psychiatrists.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, vocal American Neurological Association (ANA) members testified before Congress, arguing that there needed to be such an institute.

They articulated the arguments which had already been made on a smaller scale by citizens' groups for diseases such as multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, epilepsy, and blindness.

[8] The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Blindness (NINDB), the original name for the NINDS, was officially established on November 22, 1950, three months after President Harry Truman signed the Omnibus Medical Research Act (Public Law 81-692) on August 15, 1950.

[10] The legislation had been passed with the efforts of Senator Claude Pepper, who was responsible for helping the majority of the NIH institutes get their start, wealthy New York entrepreneur Mary Lasker,[11] and Fight for Sight founder Mildred Weisenfeld, who had retinitis pigmentosa.

For example, blindness was added because some concerned citizens raised the issue with Lasker who, in turn asked Congressman Andrew Biemiller to do so in Congress.

[12] NINDB was "responsible for conducting and supporting research and training in the 200 neurological and sensory disorders that affected 20 million individuals in the United States and were 'the first cause of permanent crippling and the third cause of death.

[13] In the beginning, the NINDB had an Advisory Council made of six medical professional and lay people, all appointed by the U. S. Surgeon General.

The NCRND presented a coherent research proposal to Congress and in 1953 the NINDB received a separate line item budget of $4.5 million.

[16] Bailey established the extramural grants and field investigations into retrolental fibroplasia, geographic distribution of multiple sclerosis, and projects related to mental retardation and cerebral palsy.

[17] During the 1950s, Mary Lasker, Senator Lister Hill and Representative John E. Fogarty ensured continued financial support for NINDB.

In his history of the NINDS, Rowland explains that "authorities later doubted that they had much lasting impact on stroke theory or therapy.

[26] Johnson and Lasker wanted to see people benefit right away while the director of the NIH, Shannon, and other scientists were more cautious about using knowledge they did not fully understand and skeptical of the "disease-of-the-month approach".

For example, King Engel and his team discovered that prednisone could effectively treat myasthenia gravis and acetazolamide was shown to prevent periodic paralysis.

"[1] "Most NINDS-funded research is conducted by extramural scientists in public and private institutions, such as universities, medical schools, and hospitals.

NINDS intramural scientists, working in the Institute's laboratories, branches, and clinics, also conduct research in most of the major areas of neuroscience and on many of the most important and challenging neurological disorders.

[24] The Division itself is broken down into "program clusters" that are "organized around critical, cross-cutting scientific topics that hold great promise for advancing knowledge and reducing the burden of neurological disease".

[24] They are: Repair and Plasticity; Systems and Cognitive Neuroscience; Channels, Synapses, and Circuits; Neurogenetics; Neural Environment; and Neurodegeneration.

Finally, it consults with and outside scientists, health organizations, and medical associational to help identify research needs and develops necessary programs to meet them.