Spinal cord stimulation helps people with stroke regain arm movement

Two upper body paraplegics from stroke regain partial arm movement after electrical stimulation of neurons in spinal cord

To Grace Wade

Electrical stimulation of spinal cord neurons in two stroke-induced upper-body paraplegics partially restored arm function. This is the first time spinal cord stimulation has been used to treat upper body paralysis in humans.

Stroke is the leading cause of paralysis in the United States. Brain signals can be permanently weakened so that neurons in the spinal cord cannot detect the signals and induce movement. “What if there was a way to make our spinal circuits more receptive so that we could suddenly hear more?” says Marco Capogrosso of the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania.

He and his colleagues surgically placed eight electrical nodes bilaterally in the spinal cord of two people who were paralyzed from the upper body due to stroke. It’s a minimally invasive procedure that uses a catheter to pass his eight connected electrodes through a spaghetti-sized hole, he says. The activated nodes electrically stimulated neurons in the spine that control arm movements, making them more sensitive to brain signals.

Participants completed a task measuring arm strength, movement, and function five days a week for four weeks. With the electrodes on, the first participant had a 40% increase in her grip strength, and the second had a 108% increase in hers. Both were able to reach objects in the virtual reality environment that were unreachable when stimulation was off.

The first participant was also able to unlock and eat independently using the utensils for the first time in 9 years when the stimulus was on. A second participant was unable to complete these tasks due to more severe paralysis, although he was able to grasp the metal cylinder, lift it, and place it on the wooden peg. , which could not do without stimulation.

“What we didn’t expect was that some of this recovery persisted even when the stimulus was removed,” says Capogrosso. The participant completed an assessment measuring motor recovery on a 66-point scale before the study and 4 weeks after his last stimulation. The score of the first participant he increased by 11 points, and the second he increased by 2 points.

“This has great potential for treating stroke, especially because the technology we’re using is already approved for other diseases,” Capogrosso said.

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