New therapy helps Reeve move, feel

Christopher Reeve, the actor and director who was paralyzed after breaking his neck in an equestrian accident in 1995, has regained the ability to move parts of his body and is able to feel previously imperceptible physical sensations, marking progress that doctors had believed was impossible in a person with such severe injuries.

The improvement -- achieved through an experimental program involving intense electrical stimulation of his muscles and nerves -- is modest but unprecedented, allowing Reeve to make small movements with his elbows, wrists, fingers, hips and knees. And although the Superman star still must use a wheelchair, he can now breathe for more than an hour without a ventilator and propel himself through water, according to his doctors and a newly published medical journal report.

The therapy has also increased Reeve's muscle mass, reversed his bone-weakening osteoporosis and reduced his frequency of infections, dramatically boosting his quality of life. Taken together, the improvement exceeds anything previously documented in the medical literature for someone with an injury as serious as Reeve's, his doctors said.

Some experts said Tuesday that while the odds remain extremely small, it may even be possible that Reeve will someday be able to walk.

"If you'd asked me two years ago if he'd be able to move his hand today, I'd have said no," said John Jane, the University of Virginia neurosurgeon who first operated on Reeve and who contributed to the new report, published in the September issue of the Journal of Neurosurgery. "Where it goes from here is quite honestly up in the air."

In answering a questionnaire for his doctors, Reeve said he was elated with the improvement. "I feel that the progress that I've made so far is symbolic of the progress that is yet to come."

At 42, Reeve suffered a so-called C2 spinal cord injury after being thrown from a jumping horse and landing on his head. The injury blocked almost all neural communication between brain and body and left him paralyzed from the neck down.

"It's the absolute nightmare of all spinal cord injuries," said Andrew Casden, associate director of the spine institute at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York. "We generally don't see improvement in these patients."

In fact, Reeve saw virtually no improvement during the first five years after the accident. Then, in 1999, he began an experimental regimen under the direction of John McDonald, a neurological surgeon at Washington University in St. Louis.

Three times a week, electrodes were attached to Reeve's legs while he sat strapped to a special exercise bicycle. Electrical current made his leg muscles rhythmically contract, working the bicycle for an hour per day.

In separate sessions, electrodes stimulated the nerves that send signals to his abdominals, triceps, biceps, deltoids and wrists. As those muscles strengthened, Reeve began a series of exercises in a pool, where he gradually gained the ability to push off from the pool's edge and take small steps while being held upright in the buoyant environment.

The goal was partly to gain muscle strength, improve circulation and build up cardiorespiratory endurance. Perhaps more important, but less well documented, the therapy aims to use body movements to "re-educate" the few surviving spinal nerve cells, teaching them to make new connections and take over tasks that severed nerves used to do.

In November 2000, Reeve realized he could control his left index finger. Other fingers followed, then the right hand came under his control, and then he got his arm and leg muscles moving.

Sensory perception improved even more. By July 2001 he could feel the touch of a finger on his skin over about half of his body, and more recently he has been able to detect pin pricks, heat and cold.

"He can feel his son's hand, which is emotionally very boosting," said Wesley Combs, Reeve's publicist.

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