This should make rehabilitation – teaching the brain to do useful things again – dramatically more successful.
- James Fawcett
Spinal cord injury is, in many respects, a testosterone disease, says Professor James Fawcett.
What he means by this is that four out of five spinal cord injuries happen to men, and the most common age group is early adulthood. “Men are not good at assessing risk at that age,” he says. “Females are much more sensible.”
It is perhaps not surprising, then, that when asked about their priorities, most quadriplegic people will select a return of sexual function as second after the use of arms and hands. Third on the list, above being able to walk, is a return of bladder and bowel control. “Way down the list is walking, because wheelchairs work reasonably well and patients can get used to using them,” says Fawcett, who heads the John van Geest Centre for Brain Repair at Cambridge.
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Image: Wheelchair
Credit: Zeevveez
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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