New Rehabilitation Technologies Help Patients Walk Again

Kentucky mother Kaycie Jackson is relearning to walk after surgery to remove two spinal tumors left her wheelchair-bound. At UofL Health’s Frazier Rehabilitation Institute, the ZeroG 3-D Body-Weight Support System helps her practice walking, balance and challenging movements while gradually reducing assistance; she has progressed from using a wheelchair to walking with a cane and sometimes without one. Jackson has also recently driven her children again and hopes to return to playing baseball with them. Separately, a 12-year-old Russian girl paralyzed in a car crash regained sensation and lower-limb movement after receiving a closed-loop spinal neural-interface implant in China and three months of intensive rehabilitation, allowing her to walk more than 10 meters with assistive equipment. Doctors said the girl’s recovery is promising, though independent walking remains a future goal.