U.S. Doctors have succeeded for the first time a person with a severe spinal cord injury is capable of up voluntarily and stand for four minutes. The patient, Rob Summers, now 25, is even capable of walking on a treadmill with assistance. More surprising to the doctors is that Summers will be moved to the foot joints, knees and hips. And substantial improvement to their quality of life, has partly recovered from the bladder control and sexual function.
This exceptional recovery, which launches today in the online edition of The Lancet medical journal, was made possible thanks to the introduction of a device with 16 electrodes in the lumbar spine Summers. The device transmits the neurons of the spinal electrical stimuli similar to those coming from the brain in people without SCI. Almost as important as the electrodes is that Summers has followed an intensive training program to retrain your brain cells and regain control of his legs. Summers
paraplegic after being hit in Oregon in the summer of 2006. Was out gathering at midnight sports bag he had left in his car when another vehicle appeared at full speed, jumped the curb and ran over him. Summers was lying on the floor with a spinal cord injury at the height of the blades. The driver was never identified.
In December 2009, three and a half years after the accident, underwent surgery to implant electrodes in the lumbar region. Before had been more than two years doing preparatory exercises, designed to produce muscle movements necessary to get up and walk.
few weeks after surgery, those two long years of effort were rewarded. Summers managed to get up and stand. That showed that neurons in the spinal cord are able to control the movement of the legs independently, without receiving orders from the brain, if they receive appropriate sensory stimuli of the feet and legs. "The bone is intelligent," said in a statement Reggie Edgerton, a neurobiologist at the University of California at Los Angeles and director of research.
But the greatest reward came a few months later, when Summers regained the ability to voluntarily move the joints of the toes, ankles, knees and hips. That meant that nerve fibers that had not been severed in the accident, despite having been inactive for more than three years, were recycled after the surgery and had recovered part of the leg muscle control. They were not only spinal neurons that allowed the rise Summers, was the brain which allowed him to move the joints at will.
There is no precedent in the world where a paraplegic patient has recovered so much functionality in the legs. Now if you need to study electrode implants tested in Summers, who was in good shape and retained some sensation in the legs, are equally effective in other patients. Edgerton's team has begun a clinical trial and has five volunteers.
In the future, researchers hope to improve the treatment using electrode devices specially designed for the recovery of spinal cord injury, as has been done in which Summers was designed for the treatment of pain. And hope that implanting electrodes supplement with some drugs help improve outcomes, as has been shown to occur in animal experiments. "Although the results are encouraging, we must be cautious, says Edgerton. Much remains to be done. " ROB SUMMERS
Patient
paraplegic "For someone like me, who for four years I have been unable to move a toe, have the freedom and ability to stand up for myself is an extraordinary feeling"
Video
Josep Corbella
The Vanguard 20/05/2011
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