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Leg-Paralysis Sensing, Stimulation Device Steps Up
AndreV writes "After 30 years of development, a device developed at Simon Fraser University that assists people to walk who have paralysis in one leg will soon be on the market in Europe and, eventually, in the US and Canada. The pacemaker-like Neurostep uses nerve cuffs to sense and stimulate nerve activity in the paralyzed leg, allowing greater mobility for those suffering from neurological disabilities such as stroke, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injury, or cerebral palsy. About the size of a cell phone, the 'brain' integrates three digital modules: the neurosensing module (receives nerve impulses), real-time adaptive control module (interrogates the signals and identifies physical events), and neurostimulation module (delivers stimulation to the target nerve). It was recently approved for use in Europe, and they are working to begin clinical trials and introduce the device in the US."
Zombies. well, not zombies exactly - but I can imagine a scifi book where they use a centralized bot brain to animate vegetative-state or newly-corpses for slave labor.
meh
timothy is going to hell
Superflous stupid, comma in the title.
Oh come on.. it's a real knee slapper!
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
Damn. I'm sorry Christopher Reeve didn't live to see this -- he spent so much of his time fighting to promote research on paralysis, and this is such an exciting development.
Middle-aged professional woman still plays computer games. Film at 11.
...a device developed at Simon Fraser University that assists people who have paralysis in one leg to walk will soon be on the market in Europe and, eventually, in the US and Canada.
Simon Fraser University is IN Canada, why will it be on the market in Europe BEFORE Canada!?
The Simon Fraser studies were covered by "60 Minutes" not long ago.
Long ago, they also covered the first such computerized device. A paralyzed young woman 'rode' a motorized stationary bicycle. An electromyelogram controlled by an Apple II recorded signals from her muscles. These signals were moved to a device that she could wear which used the recorded signals to control stimulation signals sent to those muscles. This artificially controlled her legs for her allowing her to walk. She was just learning to when the story came out. She stated that she planned on being able to walk down the aisle to get married, with a year. Less than a month later Dan Rather reported on the CBS Evening News that the woman did in fact walk down the aisle using the device. That was the second time I saw Dan Rather cry on the air, the first being just after the Apollo 8 Christmas eve reading of Genesis following their first pass behind the moon.
I tried finding record of the earlier reports to find out if it was the start of the Simon Fraser work, but couldn't locate any.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
What could possibly go wrong?
It says nothing about what the neural cuffs do, or how they do it, or what they do it for. All it says is that there is some 'electromagic' box connected to the nerves, helping paralyzed people in some mysterious way. And that it took time and money to make.
This lack of real information irritates me.
What is it? Investor fodder?
Kim0
No it's not, I'm hopping mad!
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
i told an elderly lady that i would get her a some mechanical legs like the military is designing so that a person can lift a ton and only feel a couple pounds at max. i was thinking of a scaled down model for her because she has some sort of wobbly leg problem, i believe it would only be for one leg but maybe this would be better for her. i was wondering if anybody knew more information about this, maybe a trial version or test thing for research. (sorry i forget words occasionally).