Jeremy
10-05-2002, 10:16 AM
Academy honors CWRU professor for aid to disabled
10/05/02
Brian E. Albrecht
Plain Dealer Reporter
About 200 people will be able to use once-paralyzed hands to give P. Hunter Peckham an electrically powered salute as he is inducted into the National Academy of Engineering tomorrow in Washington.
The Case Western Reserve University professor of biomedical engineering and orthopedics is being bestowed with the highest professional honors for an engineer, for his work in functional electrical stimulation (FES) to restore hand/arm control to quadriplegics.
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The National Academy of Engineering has 46 Ohio members and is part of the National Academy of Sciences.
National Academy of Engineering membership honors those who have made "important contributions to engineering theory and practice."
It also honors those who have demonstrated "unusual accomplishment in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology."
Peckham's work includes research on the "Freehand" neuroprosthesis, consisting of a pacemaker-type device implanted in the chest that sends electrical impulses from an external controller and power source to electrodes surgically implanted in muscles of the forearm and hand. Since 1997, the Freehand system has been implanted in some 200 patients at nearly 30 medical centers worldwide.
Peckham said Freehand and subsequent FES systems "enable people with spinal cord injuries to grasp and release common objects and thus perform everyday activities such as eating, writing and grooming. These functions, which are essential for independence and self-sufficiency, often lead to dramatic changes in patients' lives."
Peckham, 58, of Cleveland Heights, is a research scientist at the Department of Veterans Affairs, and director of the Functional Electrical Stimulation Center of Excellence, a consortium of CWRU, the Cleveland VA Medical Center and MetroHealth Medical Center.
His election in February with 74 others to the National Academy of Engineering came as a total surprise, Peckham said, and was "an incredibly nice honor."
He said he has enjoyed his nearly 30 years' work in the field for several reasons, the biggest being "helping people, the impact on people with a disability."
Damage to the central nervous system is the major cause of disability in the United States, Peckham said, and FES research could conceivably benefit hundreds of thousands of Americans with paralysis or mobility limitations due to spinal cord or head injuries, stroke and disease.
He also enjoys the work for its challenge. "You're talking about things that have to last a lifetime within the body, maybe 50 years, and we have to be able to envision how technology might change, because the things you're developing now might be outdated by technological advances in a couple of decades."
In a paper presented to the National Academy of Engineering on "Re-engineering the Paralyzed Nervous System," Peckham listed several hurdles that have to be overcome in using artificial means to replace the body's natural transmission of nerve impulses.
These include developing a system that will not harm or overly fatigue muscles and will mimic normal muscle function, be durable enough to operate within the body and yet still be accessible for repair and be easy and natural to use.
Peckham said future research will refine the hardware, expand potential applications (such as bladder control), and work in conjunction with other clinical approaches such as gene therapies, stem cell transplants and tissue engineering to overcome nerve damage.
"New [FES] devices will almost certainly address a wider range of problems and benefit a growing number of individuals," he added.
And for Peckham, that's the personal payoff of the work - seeing the results on those who directly gain from FES research. "To see a person who has had a very devastating spinal cord injury, who has the wherewithal to challenge themselves to overcome that disability and gain independence, is phenomenal," he said.
"It's astounding, then, to realize that these type of things we do really help."
"If the wind could blow my troubles away. I'd stand in front of a hurricane."
10/05/02
Brian E. Albrecht
Plain Dealer Reporter
About 200 people will be able to use once-paralyzed hands to give P. Hunter Peckham an electrically powered salute as he is inducted into the National Academy of Engineering tomorrow in Washington.
The Case Western Reserve University professor of biomedical engineering and orthopedics is being bestowed with the highest professional honors for an engineer, for his work in functional electrical stimulation (FES) to restore hand/arm control to quadriplegics.
From Our Advertiser
The National Academy of Engineering has 46 Ohio members and is part of the National Academy of Sciences.
National Academy of Engineering membership honors those who have made "important contributions to engineering theory and practice."
It also honors those who have demonstrated "unusual accomplishment in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology."
Peckham's work includes research on the "Freehand" neuroprosthesis, consisting of a pacemaker-type device implanted in the chest that sends electrical impulses from an external controller and power source to electrodes surgically implanted in muscles of the forearm and hand. Since 1997, the Freehand system has been implanted in some 200 patients at nearly 30 medical centers worldwide.
Peckham said Freehand and subsequent FES systems "enable people with spinal cord injuries to grasp and release common objects and thus perform everyday activities such as eating, writing and grooming. These functions, which are essential for independence and self-sufficiency, often lead to dramatic changes in patients' lives."
Peckham, 58, of Cleveland Heights, is a research scientist at the Department of Veterans Affairs, and director of the Functional Electrical Stimulation Center of Excellence, a consortium of CWRU, the Cleveland VA Medical Center and MetroHealth Medical Center.
His election in February with 74 others to the National Academy of Engineering came as a total surprise, Peckham said, and was "an incredibly nice honor."
He said he has enjoyed his nearly 30 years' work in the field for several reasons, the biggest being "helping people, the impact on people with a disability."
Damage to the central nervous system is the major cause of disability in the United States, Peckham said, and FES research could conceivably benefit hundreds of thousands of Americans with paralysis or mobility limitations due to spinal cord or head injuries, stroke and disease.
He also enjoys the work for its challenge. "You're talking about things that have to last a lifetime within the body, maybe 50 years, and we have to be able to envision how technology might change, because the things you're developing now might be outdated by technological advances in a couple of decades."
In a paper presented to the National Academy of Engineering on "Re-engineering the Paralyzed Nervous System," Peckham listed several hurdles that have to be overcome in using artificial means to replace the body's natural transmission of nerve impulses.
These include developing a system that will not harm or overly fatigue muscles and will mimic normal muscle function, be durable enough to operate within the body and yet still be accessible for repair and be easy and natural to use.
Peckham said future research will refine the hardware, expand potential applications (such as bladder control), and work in conjunction with other clinical approaches such as gene therapies, stem cell transplants and tissue engineering to overcome nerve damage.
"New [FES] devices will almost certainly address a wider range of problems and benefit a growing number of individuals," he added.
And for Peckham, that's the personal payoff of the work - seeing the results on those who directly gain from FES research. "To see a person who has had a very devastating spinal cord injury, who has the wherewithal to challenge themselves to overcome that disability and gain independence, is phenomenal," he said.
"It's astounding, then, to realize that these type of things we do really help."
"If the wind could blow my troubles away. I'd stand in front of a hurricane."