Why Walk On?
In today’s over burdened and under resourced healthcare system the rehabilitation of spinal cord injured people is largely limited to meeting the immediate challenges of this most drastic and life changing injury.
The traditional wisdom of “you’ll never walk again” has bred an outlook of little hope and little use in trying.
Patients are returned to the community with no prescription for continuing improvement in recovery over their lifetime.
It wasn’t until very recently that the benefits of exercise have been recognised in advancing the recovery of people with spinal cord injury. Although today, to quote from scientific literature, “Recent evidence indicates that those people with incomplete Spinal Cord Injury can continue to improve their functional abilities with vigorous and active physical rehabilitation after SCI (Dobkin et al., 2006).” from International Campaign for Cures of spinal cord injury Paralysis (ICCP) , Clinical Trial Guidelines Panel www.campaignforcure.org.Furthermore, the discoveries of basic science, with stem cells and the like, are heralding a promising new era for the repair of damaged spinal cord nerves. Today, more than a dozen clinical trials are being undertaken around the world using cellular ad pharmacological strategies to repair these damaged CNS nerves. Whilst not a “today or tomorrow” proposition, it is likely these repair strategies will be in clinical use in the next decade.
In reality however, repairing damaged nerves won’t be enough to help the muscles of a person whose limbs have been dormant for 10 or even 5 years.
Therefore, it is imperative people with spinal cord injury are given;
- The opportunity to maximise their recovery for today, with intensive exercise strategies.
- The chance to keep healthy, keep their bones strong, and muscles alive, so they can take full advantage of “nerve repair” strategies that may emerge during their lifetime.
It is a fact that most spinal cord injuries are sustained by young, healthy, active people in their teens and early twenties. It is simply inhumane, in 2008, to consign these people to 40 or 50 years locked in a wheelchair with out any form of hope for maximising their functionality.
Today, the unfortunate reality for the more than 300 Australians who suffer a spinal injury each year, is to be returned home with no prescription for ongoing recovery.
Walk On SCI Recovery Project, utilising successful exercise methodologies like those developed by Project Walk, will give young Australians living with spinal cord injury every opportunity to maximise their recovery and keep healthy for the promise of emerging technologies.
Providing these opportunities will dramatically change the outlook for people living with SCI. It will improve their health, improve their enjoyment of life and completely change their prospects for the future.
