Paul Robinson, now 34, broke a vertebrae in a 2015 dirt bike accident. He uses a wheelchair, and his arm and hand function were affected. But after undergoing an innovative nerve transfer surgery, he's now able to propel himself and pick up items.
Australian Paul Robinson, now 34, broke a vertebrae when he landed on his head in a dirt bike accident in 2015. It left him confined to a wheelchair and rarely able to leave his home.
"I had no motor and muscle control below my nipples. It also affected my arm function and I had zero function in my hands," he said.But after undergoing nerve transfer surgery, a technique pioneered on spinal cord injuries by surgeons in Australia, he's now able to use his hands and arms to propel his own wheelchair, pick up items from the ground, and with one hand use a television remote control and hold a glass.
While some experimental treatments such as cell transplants and implants of electrical stimulators could help paralyzed people walk again, Dr. Ida Fox, a physician and a surgery professor at the Washington University in St Louis, said that nerve transfers are safe, reliable and circumvented risky spine-level surgery.
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