Doctor Experimenting WIth Stem Cells To Help Those Who Are Paralyzed

Nearly 300,000 people in the U.S. are living with a spinal cord injury. Every year 12,000 people are told they’ll never walk again after an accident. What if one injection of stem cells could pump new movement and new hope into a paralyzed body? A scientist who’s spent the past decade in the lab looking for a cure said a new treatment is within reach. If he’s right, it could revolutionize the treatment of spinal cord injuries. Continue Reading »

LINCOLN — Larry Schroetlin rarely came across problems he couldn’t solve.

He was an auto mechanic and loved to fix things. Townspeople depended on him and he always delivered, every time, even if it meant skipping lunch or Christmas dinner to change a friend’s tire.

He married his high school sweetheart, raised three sons and owned the only repair shop in Butte, Neb. He was an active man, piloting single-engine aircraft through the 1980s until it got too expensive. Continue Reading »

Nearly 300,000 people in the U.S. are living with a spinal cord injury. Every year, 12,000 people are told they’ll never walk again after an accident.

But what if one injection of stem cells could pump new movement into a paralyzed body?

A scientist who’s spent the past decade looking for a cure says a new treatment is within reach.

What started out as a day on the beach ended up changing 31-year-old Janne Kouri’s future. Continue Reading »

Veterans from Illinois, Missouri and seven other states will benefit from a $236,000 donation given to the Veterans Affairs Spinal Cord Injury Center by the Ameristar Casino.

The donation is the largest received by the St. Louis Veterans Affairs Spinal Cord Injury center, according to Public Affairs Manager Marcena Gunter.

A ceremony was held Wednesday to present the donation to the VA center at the center, located at Jefferson Barracks. Continue Reading »

The Winter Olympics were a huge success, bringing Canadians together as never before, shining a new light on our province, and proving that yes, we can do it.

There is a good chance, however, that Vancouver 2010 will be known as much for the Paralympics that followed as for the Olympics themselves.

For the first time in the history of the Games, disabled athletes were celebrated not for the adversity they had overcome, but for their athletic abilities. Continue Reading »

Ben Sykes, executive director of the UK National Stem Cell Network gives an overview of where stem cell research is heading

Few readers of this article will not have read a news story or heard a news report about stem cell research and its current and potential medical applications. After all, it is an exciting and promising area of science. Continue Reading »

VANCOUVER — Rick Hansen is a man on the move again.

On Sunday, the 25th anniversary of the start of his Man in Motion World Tour, Hansen launched another global adventure in his quest to find a cure for spinal cord injury.

This time, he’s set the goal of raising $200 million for spinal-cord research, within the 26 months it took him to circle the globe in his wheelchair. Continue Reading »

The Cleveland Clinic has received a $1 million federal grant to research treatments for spinal cord injuries.

The National Institutes of Health grant will help lead investigator Yu-Shang Lee develop surgical treatments that might allow nerves to regenerate and the bladder to recover after a spinal cord injury. Continue Reading »

A SPLIT-second decision changed Anthony Bartl’s life forever.

In a hurry to get to his friend’s house after school, the then six-year-old didn’t check before stepping out to cross the road.

He was hit by a car and broke his neck, sustaining the worst spinal injury possible.

Diagnosed as a C1 quadriplegic, he was paralysed from the neck down.

Now, aged 29, he uses his chin to guide his wheelchair and needs a full-time carer. Continue Reading »

On her first vacation in 10 years, a severely injured Pennsylvania State Police trooper found herself being detained in Mexico by authorities investigating a fatal crash.

For 13 hours, Jean Altomari lay strapped to a spinal board in a primitive hospital some 1,500 miles from home. With her insurance card locked in a safe on a Carnival Legend cruise ship, treatment was minimal and an immediate transfer to a trauma center in Florida delayed. What little Spanish she knew wasn’t helping, and no one around her spoke much English. Continue Reading »