SCIENTISTS have figured out how mice can regain some ability to walk after spinal cord injuries, and hope this insight can lead to a new approach to restoring function in people paralysed by similar damage.

The research, published today in the journal Nature Medicine, showed the brain and spinal cord were able to reorganise functions after a spinal cord injury to restore communication at the cellular level needed for walking. Continue Reading »

Three days before Christmas — and three months and two days after suffering a debilitating spinal cord injury on the South Gwinnett High School football field — Arquevious Crane came home.

He came home to a red-brick, four-bedroom house in a picturesque Loganville subdivision with neatly manicured lawns. The house was a gift — talk about great Christmas presents — from the Snell family of E.R. Snell Contractors Inc., a clan with a heart the size of the Comets’ football field named after business co-founder Richard Snell.

But it was more than that. The $225,000 house is a tangible symbol of the charity of a community that wiped its collective tears and let its compassionate spirit burst through after Crane was felled on Sept. 20. Continue Reading »

Spinal cord damage blocks the routes that the brain uses to send messages to the nerve cells that control walking. Until now, doctors believed that the only way for injured patients to walk again was to re-grow the long nerve highways that link the brain and base of the spinal cord. For the first time, a UCLA study shows that the central nervous system can reorganize itself and follow new pathways to restore the cellular communication required for movement.

Published in the January edition of Nature Medicine, the discovery could lead to new therapies for the estimated 250,000 Americans who suffer from traumatic spinal cord injuries. An additional 10,000 cases occur each year, according to the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, which helped fund the UCLA study. Continue Reading »

BEIJING (AP) — They’re paralyzed from diving accidents and car crashes, disabled by Parkinson’s, or blind. With few options available at home in America, they search the Internet for experimental treatments — and often land on Web sites promoting stem cell treatments in China.

They mortgage their houses and their hometowns hold fundraisers as they scrape together the tens of thousands of dollars needed for travel and the hope for a miracle cure.

A number of these medical tourists claim some success when they return home: Continue Reading »

BEIJING (AP) – They’re paralyzed from diving accidents and car crashes, disabled by Parkinson’s, or blind. With few options available at home in America, they search the Internet for experimental treatments _ and often land on Web sites promoting stem cell treatments in China.

They mortgage their houses and their hometowns hold fundraisers as they scrape together the tens of thousands of dollars needed for travel and the hope for a miracle cure. Continue Reading »

Syracuse (WSYR-TV) – The Syracuse VA Hospital is on the verge of a $78 million upgrade, complete with new technology and a six story addition.

At the center of the project will be a brand new state-of-the-art spinal cord injury center. It’s the VA’s attempt to expand its services as demand for them grows.

Paralyzed from the waste down for the last ten years, Air Force vet Steve Kraeger relies on the Syracuse VA hospital.

“It’s a godsend, it’s a blessing, especially this facility here and I’ve been in a lot of units.” Continue Reading »