Extensively illustrated and easy to use, this practical resource offers clear guidelines and step-by-step sequences for moving and working with individuals with differing levels of paralysis. It serves as both an ideal student textbook and a valuable clinical manual for therapists who see tetraplegic and paraplegic patients. Clear, practical, concise chapters present important information in an easily understandable approach.Spiral-bound format enables the book to lay flat for easy reference in the clinical setting or classroom.Excellent coverage of wheelchairs and wheelchair management is included. All illustrations have been redrawn for increased clarity, to enhance the clinical usefulness of this resource.Audit and evidence-based practice is incorporated throughout.Discussion of patient empowerment is included.The chapter on hands has been expanded to provide more in-depth coverage of this important topic.New discussion of levers has been added to this edition.New chapter on aging offers insight and considerations for treating aging and elderly patients with spinal cord injury.Expanded section on equipment provides details on current and state-of-the-art equipment used in practice.

Spinal cord injury related paraplegia changes a person's life in a sudden way. The most important issue for physicians, therapists and caregivers is to manage the complications that arise, and help paraplegic subjects return to a productive integrated life within society. The book Topics in Paraplegia provides modern knowledge in this direction. Addressing hot topics related to paraplegia, ranging from surgical management to research therapies with mesenchymal stem cells, this book could be a valued reference for physiatrists, neurosurgeons, orthopaedic surgeons, neurologists and physical therapists. The book is organized into four sections. The first covers the epidemiology and psychological conditions associated with paraplegia, the second discusses surgical management and common rehabilitation interventions; the third medical complications and special musculoskeletal issues, while the last outlines current research in animals and humans.

Unique case-based guide to generating diagnostic possibilities based on the patients' symptoms. Invaluable for psychiatrists and neurologists.

In the last 20 years, fundamental research to repair the spinal cord has yielded positive results and today, there is real hope that a cure might be found for the treatment of spinal injuries. This has only been possible because in the last 70 years, patients with a traumatic injury of the spinal cord have been kept alive through conservative forms of treatment and returned to useful independent lives. It is salutary at this stage to look at how this conservative treatment developed. This book begins by providing a history of the treatment of spinal cord injuries and continues by examining the pertinent epidemiology, injury characteristics, and outcomes of spinal cord injury in children. It also discusses anaesthetic management of patients with chronic spinal cord injury; morphological changes of toenails in hemiplegia; and spasticity.

Spinal paralysis is probably the most devastat the President of the International Medical So ing of all the illnesses that can befall man. Only ciety of Paraplegia. He has made many signifi a few years ago, 80% of spinal victims were cant contributions, both in the initial treatment dead within three years due to the complica and in the later rehabilitation of spinal cord tions that frequently accompany the condition. victims. He is a man who truly cares about peo Today, the situation is quite diH'erent and 80% ple. He is superbly organized, meticulous in his of spinal victims have a relatively normal life planning, and energetic in his execution of expectancy. The author of this book was one of goals. He demands and receives perfection the first to realize that if a paraplegic patient is from his staff. As a result, his Spinal Unit in carefully looked after in the early stages of his Perth, Australia is one of the best treatment illness and if all of the potential complications and rehabilitation centers in the world. His are prevented, that individual can eventually knowledge, from both the scientific and prac recover sufficient function to live a productive tical viewpoints, is truly staggering-a fact that and independent life. This basic concept un is quite obvious from the details contained in derlies the modern approach to the treatment this book. of spinal injuries.