- Hi everyone, Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program with an important compelling conversation about spinal cord research and rehabilitation with Dr. Steven Kirshblum, Chief Medical Officer at Kessler Foundation.

Good to see you again, doctor.

Thanks for joining us.

- Thank you so much for inviting me.

- So I’ve, over the years I've done a fair amount of research, excuse me, leadership coaching with researchers and scientists at Kessler Foundation who do important work.

But it's very difficult sometimes to communicate to folks who have not gone to the same schools at the same level and done that kind of research and are not scientists.

What in layperson's language, doctor, is the spinal cord research and rehabilitation that you're involved in that is so important?

Let me also disclose that you are in fact Christopher Reeve's physician and were featured in the documentary on CNN about the great Christopher Reeve.

Please, doctor.

- It certainly was an honor and a privilege to be the physician taking care of Christopher Reeve amongst the entire team that helped him and certainly the relationship with him and what I've learned from him.

The Center for Spinal Stimulation at the Kessler Foundation is really dedicated to finding ways to enhance function after spinal cord injury.

This function could be movement, it could include other things such as blood pressure control, such as bladder control.

And let me explain a little bit about what happens after a spinal cord injury to really understand what spinal stimulation does.

Under normal circumstances, the brain sends messages through the spinal cord.

These messages are disrupted by the injury.

The communication is interrupted and isn't going as well as it should, but it's also important to recognize that there's information coming from the environment that comes back up through the spinal cord that may go to the brain.

Even more important is that the spinal cord is not just a passive relay system of wires going back and forth.

Spinal stimulation sensitizes, makes the spinal cord more receptive to work the way that it normally would.

- Okay, but this breakthrough surgery that you and your colleagues have developed, explain what that does to impact the process you just described, doctor.

- Okay, so there are a couple of different ways to stimulate the spinal cord.

We can stimulate the spinal cord by using transcutaneous across skin type of stimulation.

- Compared to?

- Compared to a surgical approach called epidural spinal stimulation.

Were we replace the electrodes during a surgical procedure directly onto the spinal cord.

Now naturally there are pros and cons of each.

What we did that was really special was we're first in the northeast to do this where we implanted the spinal cord stimulator into the person with spinal cord injury, to then be able to work with that individual in enhancing multiple different functions for them.

- What kind of impact could that have on the quality of that person's life who's dealing with a spinal cord injury?

And I know it depends.

It's case by case, patient by patient.

- Sure.

But after a spinal cord injury, there's so much that changes for a person.

We oftentimes think about walking and certainly walking is important, but it's certainly every daily activities that are impacted.

I mentioned before, just the ability to control urine or bowel or spasticity or just control blood pressure where the person just sort of never feels fully awake By stimulating the spinal cord at the right site with the right stimulation, frequency and other aspects with the right physical rehabilitation training, we can allow the spinal cord to start to work like it normally would.

It is sort of like a functional reorganization of the spinal cord so that it could regain certain functional activities and this could lead to significant changes for a person's quality of life.

- My understanding, and again, working with a fair number of your researchers and scientists, I often think I understand the research process, but I realize I don't meaning it's much more complex.

This research that was done to develop this surgery, how complex meaning how many patients over how much time and what had to be proven before you actually started to move forward with the surgery?

- So it certainly takes a lot of time.

So we're not the first in the world to do this.

We collaborate with people who have been doing this for a while.

We work together.

We've been collaborators for over a decade.

And we've been learning together how to perform this and bring it to New Jersey and then be able to perform it.

So there have been in...

The group that we are working with, over 50 patients that have now been implanted and each one has regained certain different functional activities.

And from each participant we learn much more and this is how we continue to advance the science and the opportunities for the people that- - Is that a clinical...

Sorry to interrupt, doctor.

But is that a clinical trial?

- So we are doing a clinical trial.

It's an NIH sponsored clinical trial.

- National Institutes of Health, been in the news a little bit lately.

Go ahead, doctor.

- Yes, no doubt that the primary investigator of that is Claudia Angeli.

She's the assistant director of our program.

Gail Forrest is the director of the program.

And this is specifically for a person who is injured less than one year, which is really very novel to implant them and then be able to help them regain certain activities including bladder function, blood pressure, standing, et cetera.

- So last question.

People say, oh, the NIH, I hear about them all the time in the news.

There are major cutbacks and I have no interest in discussing politics because that's not what we do here.

But what we do wanna understand is and for the average person watching right now, that average person is pretty above average in terms of concern and interest in public policy that impacts people's lives and research like the type you're talking about, NIH's role in this process a minute or less, what is it and why does it matter?

- Well, it matters because you need funding in order to move science.

Science discovery takes a lot of time, effort, knowledge, and financial backing.

We've been very lucky that Tim and Caroline Reynolds are the sponsors of our Center for Spinal Stimulation.

They really helped us get off the ground and learn.

But this study, for example, is funded by the NIH, which allows us to be able to pay for all the expenses.

Our neurosurgeon, Dr. Robert Heary who's a leader in the field is working with us, Overlook Hospital.

These things cost money and investment, there will be a great return on investment if we continue to discover these things and not only, and hopefully that we not only help people with spinal cord injury, but be able to look beyond for people with other neurologic disorders once we fully understand the mechanism of how these things work.

- 30 seconds before I let you go.

Christopher Reeve and Dana Reeve were and continue to be so important because?

- Well, they really moved everybody.

He was a relentless optimist.

He wanted to push boundaries and what was really important is he made people think that what the potential could be.

Sometimes you think about that you have to have wild dreams if you want to exceed your wildest dreams.

And what he did is he pushed everyone to think greater than they currently did.

Everyone thought the spinal cord couldn't repair itself, and now we know that there are ways to really modulate the spinal cord to perhaps bring function back to people with injuries.

- Thank you, doctor.

We appreciate it, particularly coming to us from Israel.

We wish you and your team all the best moving forward.

Thank you, doctor.

- Thank you so much.

Have a great day.

- You got it.

Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by Valley Bank.

Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

Atlantic Health System.

PSEG Foundation.

Newark Board of Education.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

NJM Insurance Group.

PSE&G.

And by Johnson & Johnson.

Promotional support provided by The New Jersey Business & Industry Association.

And by New Jersey Globe.