skip to institute navigation, skip to center navigation
- You Are Here: International Center for Spinal Cord Injury
- > Success Stories
Success Stories
The International Center for Spinal Cord Injury offers more than just the hope of recovery from what was once thought to be an irreversible and life altering injury. Through the use of Activity Based Restorative Therapies (RT) great promise has been shown helping adults and children with chronic spinal cord injuries recover sensation, movement, independence, and overall improved quality of life even many months or years after an injury.
Santa Marie Wallace
Despite her disability, Santa earned an AA degree, held jobs, and is finishing her BA at a local college where she is a Sociology major. She was able to do that even though bed and wheelchair transfers involved several people helping her stand, forcing her hands open and placing them on the walker in order to move her body 6 to 12 inches by shuffling her feet. The spinal cord injury and limitations of movement caused her body to be stiff as a board. She experienced constant pain; especially in her back, requiring narcotics, tranquilizers, and anti-inflammatory medications for relief.
Patrick Rummerfield
Patrick Rummerfield lives a life that can only be deemed miraculous. A 1974 car accident left Pat with little hope of survival. Today, this triathlete, racecar driver and motivational speaker spends each day ensuring that he makes the most of his body’s renewed power. As the world’s first fully functional spinal cord injury quadraplegic, Pat is living proof that with the right combination of quality medical care, intensive physical therapy and personal will, recovery from devastating injuries is possible.
Lily Wilkinson
Lily was just three when her neck was broken in an automobile accident. A moment of folding metal, and her new life appeared etched in stone before she had ever entered kindergarten. After months of intensive care, her parents were told she would never be able to use or feel her legs again.
Matt Courson
Matt climbed on his four-wheeler to make the short trip to visit a friend. He never made it. He can’t remember much about the ride, but he knows he went over a 20-foot embankment. When he came to after the crash, he couldn’t move.
MacKenzie Clare
MacKenzie was just ten years old and looking forward to a day of fun at Port Discovery in Baltimore with her parents and two friends on April 2, 2005. That rainy day took a different turn when a pick-up truck traveling on the opposite side of the highway lost control and veered into their lane, hitting their car, and injuring all five occupants.
Van Brooks
“I remember everything,” Brooks said the other day. “I remember making the tackle. I remember laying there and not being able to feel anything. I remember talking to the trainer, who was asking me different questions. I remember getting into an ambulance. They cut all my equipment off, then they waited for the MedEvac [medical helicopter] to come. They transferred me to the MedEvac. I remember the ride down to Shock Trauma, but once I landed at Shock Trauma, I don’t remember anything.”
Loretta McRae
In the months since the 15-year-old struck her head on an ocean sandbar in Australia, sustaining a C6-level spinal cord injury, virtually every expert said she's already gotten her miracle. She was alive, she could wiggle her toes, she was regaing sensation in her limbs. But she would probably need to use a wheelchair for the rest of her life.
Related News & Updates
September 16, 2009
International Center for Spinal Cord Injury to Participate in 2009 World Stem Cell Summit
Summer, 2009
Ravens Host International Center for Spinal Cord Injury Patients at Training Camp
July 27, 2009
Read Family Meetings: an Important Resource, by ICSCI physical therapist Varsha Gandhi in Advance the magazine for PTs and PT assistants.
Related Events
2009 World Stem Cell Summit
September 21-23, 2009
Baltimore, MD
Stompin’ for the Cord
Save the Date: October 10, 2009
Research Initiatives
NA_00014481
Patterned FES Ergometry of Arm and Shoulder in Individuals with Spinal Cord Injury
Adult Volunteers Needed
Success Stories
Patrick Rummerfield
Patrick Rummerfield lives a life that can only be deemed miraculous. A 1974 car accident left Pat with little hope of survival. Today, this triathlete, racecar driver and motivational speaker spends each day ensuring that he makes the most of his body’s renewed power.
Join Our Team
View All Positions
Where Hope and Opportunity Meet Science The International Center for Spinal Cord Injury represents something remarkable in the field of paralysis treatment: New hope
Support Our Work
With your support we are revolutionizing rehabilitation for patients with spinal cord injury and paralysis, offering something many of them have been told was lost forever: hope.
Donate Now
