[Preliminary evaluation of epidural electric stimulation of the spinal cord]

Since 1974 clinical experiments have been conducted at the Rehabilitation Centre in Konstancin near Warsaw on the effects of electrostimulating on the damaged spinal cord. As yet stimulating electrodes were implanted in 44 cases of spinal cord injury. In the present report groups of patients with total and incomplete cervical cord injury and complete injury of the thoracic spinal cord were compared. The patients were treated by surgical decompression with simultaneous implantation of stimulation electrodes in contact with the spinal cord. The control group comprised patients operated upon in the same time period, for similar injuries, who had no stimulators implanted. The terapeutic effect was better in the stimulated patients in relation to the non-stimulated ones (this was true especially of patients with injuries to the cervical spinal cord), with a greater number of neurological improvements as well as with a better quality of these improvements. The comparison confirmed also a favourable effect of spinal cord stimulation on the development of bladder automatism which was achieved in this material twice as rapidly as in non-stimulated patients. The author thinks that these data justify further investigations along these lines and suggest that electrostimulation will extend the possibilities of treatment of spinal cord injuries.