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Medical Development Paraplegics controls the right hand by chip
Paraplegia means drastic changes in life
Whether a serious accident in sports, an infection or cancer: There are many causes of paraplegia, which has the most massive impact for those affected and a sudden change in the entire life means. However, thanks to the ever-advancing technological development, patients can always be better helped. Now, US physicians have introduced a new technology that allows a paraplegic man to move his right hand through his own thoughts.
Image: GraphicCompressor - fotolia As the researchers from the Battelle Memorial Institute and the Ohio State University in Columbus report in the journal "Nature", this is possible through a chip in the brain, which translates thoughts and brain signals. The injured spinal cord is thereby bypassed, instead creating a direct connection with a cuff, which electrically stimulates those muscles that control the arm and hand, the scientists in their report.
Chip in the brain transforms brain activity into movement
"We have shown for the first time that a quadriplegic patient is able to improve his level of motor function and hand movements," Dr. Ali Rezai, co-author of the study and neurosurgeon at the Ohio State Wexner Medical Center, according to a statement from the Battelle Institute. In 2014, the scientists implanted a pea-sized computer chip in the brain area of the then 24-year-old, paraplegic Ian Burkhart from Dublin (Ohio), who is responsible for controlling the movements. For example, when Burkhart imagined a movement like "opening his hand", his brain then produced certain activity patterns.
The experts developed a special software that could decode these patterns and thereby transform the subject's thoughts into hand movements. As a result, Burkhart's hand was able to actually carry out the imaginary movement. In the meantime, it is even possible for the man to handle a credit card and play a guitar video game with his own fingers and hands, according to the announcement of the institute.
Second patient to test new technology from summer
"Over the past decade, we've learned to decipher the brain signals of completely paralyzed patients. Now these thoughts are being transformed for the first time, "said Battelle team leader Chad Bouton, according to the press release. "Our results show that signals picked up from the brain and redirected to a spinal cord injury make it possible to restore functional movement and even the movement of individual fingers," the scientist continues.
However, a broad application of the technique seems to be a vision of the future, as Burkhart was the first of five possible participants in the clinical trial. Rezai and his colleague Dr. However, Jerry Mysiw had already identified a second patient to be included in the study during the summer. "Participating in this research has changed me in the sense that I now have much more hope for the future," Burkhart is quoted in the message. "I have always had some hope, but now I know first-hand that there are advances in science and technology that will make my life better," says the man who has been paraplegic since a diving accident six years ago.
Researchers hope for development of a wireless system
In the current system, the individual parts are still wired together, but Ohio State University neurosurgeon Ali Rezai is counting on rapid progress. "We hope that this technology will evolve into a wireless system that combines brain signals and thoughts with the outside world to improve the function and quality of life for people with disabilities," said the expert. Therefore, the most important goals are to make this technology readily available for use by patients at home.
The newly developed chip is not the first technology that gives paraplegics hope for a better quality of life. According to a research group led by Susan Harkema of the University of Louisville (Kentucky / USA) in 2011, the dpa news agency succeeded in putting a paralytic subject in a standing position for a few minutes with the help of electrical muscle stimulation. A year later, a team led by Susan Mackinnon of Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, told of a man who was recovering from surgery. In this case, the doctors had reconnected nerves of the affected person, after which the nerve, which originally gave orders for the upper arm, now sent to the fingers.
Every year about 1,800 people in Germany affected
A so-called "paraplegia" arises when the spinal cord is damaged at a certain height and thus the electrical impulses can no longer pass. The areas of the body below the damaged area can then no longer be affected by the brain, resulting in paralysis of the affected limbs. The "tetraplegia" represents the heaviest form, which results from the rupture of the spinal cord at the level of the cervical spine. As a result, both legs and arms are affected, and in some cases, those affected must also be artificially ventilated. The most common cause of spinal cord injury is road or sport accidents, in addition to sickness-related cases, e.g. due to a cancer or infections. According to the German Foundation for Spinal Cord Injury (DSQ), about 1,800 people are affected by this stroke of fate in Germany alone. (No)