News Health & Medicine

A new treatment could restore some mobility in people paralyzed by strokes

An implant that electrically stimulates the spine let two patients open a lock and more

In a photo, stroke patient Heather Rendulic, who has dark hair and is wearing a dark shirt and a hospital mask, holds a Campbell's soup can. Devices used to monitor her implant are visible on her arm.

Heather Rendulic, whose left arm was paralyzed after a series of strokes nine years ago, picks up and holds a soup can thanks to a small electrical device implanted near her spinal cord.

Tim Betler/UPMC, University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences

By Darren Incorvaia

Sitting in an exam room, surrounded by doctors and scientists, Heather Rendulic opened her left hand for the first time since suffering a series of strokes nine years earlier when she was in her early 20s.