I beat an AB golfing!

[gvinton]

I'm a C5/6 "walking quad" nearly 9 months post injury. I've obviously had a very fortunate recovery since I'm even playing but it was very gratifying giving my buddy a whooping in only my second time back on a course.

I jokingly said in the rehab hospital that the injury might shave strokes off my game - who knows? http://sci.rutgers.edu/forum/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[Jim]

great to hear gvington!

... http://sci.rutgers.edu/forum/images/smilies/smile.gif...

[brians]

what does it mean that you are a walking quad,i never heard that term before

[Lizbv]

http://sci.rutgers.edu/forum/images/smilies/cool.gif

[pep84]

It means they have motor, sensory, AND they can walk, although they have limited hand function. I've seen a couple of guys like this and they have a better shot at ever walking and recovering than one of us (complete paras), regardless of how much you workout the muscles that move and don't move as you so often say. I'm not knocking you I train also it's just fact is fact and there are some who would say that we train so hard to compensate for what we can't use. One of those walking quads I knew fully recovered (atleast 90%), HOWEVER he kept up his gimp status since he didn't want to go back to work or any other pre-injury responsiblity while the state kept picking up the tab.

gvinton I have wanted to take up golf considering West Palm Beach is one huge golf course and I just haven't quite made my move yet. It's encouraging that you did so well. On the course where you played did you use one of the single golf carts? The ones intended for disabled players and the seat swings 360 degrees? I think it is amazing that once we give something a shot how fulfilling it can be even if it needs to be done with adaptive equipment. Can you say more on your experience?

[gvinton]

I've had a very significant recovery and I'm still seeing improvements in my strength, agility, etc. I broke c5/6 in September and was initially paralyzed from the neck down with little sensation as well. After traction and surgery however I started seeing return soon thereafter. Long story short I was able to walk out of a rehab hospital (with a cane) 5 weeks post. I got B & B back at about 8-10 weeks post and have been working on my strength in the gym continuously.

I went back to the golf range at about 3 months post but it wasn't pretty - my strength wasn't quite ready yet. Any club I hit went 100 yards. Today I'm not the big hitter I was pre-injury but it was respectable. One hole I actually drove one 285 yards with a breeze at my back. I don't need any special cart or anything like that - my walking is nearly normal now. I do deal with minor spasms in the morning and at night. I have a bit of Brown Sequard syndrome in that my right side is much stronger but I have trouble determining hot and cold and little pain sensations in my right leg. My left side has better sensation but is weaker and my left hand has trouble quickly opening after gripping (I can golf but I have trouble playing catch with my son because of this). The strength differences seem to be getting less all the time and I've found that creatine seems to be helping with my workouts (I used it some pre-injury as well).

Clearly I've been extremely lucky in my recovery. My friends all watched me go through this and to give him a legitimate beating (golfing) was kind of a neat milestone for me.

[Wise Young]

gvinton, that is great! Wise.

Brians, probably as many as 17% of cervical spinal cord injuries recover to become "walking quads". About 64% of people with cervical spinal cord injuries are "incomplete" and, on average, they recover 75% or more of motor function they had lost. This usually happens during the first two years after injury.

One of my first patients/friends who became a walking quad was Carey Erickson. He was pretty much fully paralyzed from C4/5 with only a small patch of sensation. Over a period of 6 months, he became more like a central cord syndrome (with ability to walk but weak arms). He eventually got to the point that if he did not tell you that he had spinal cord injury, you probably would not know it. However, he was a professional dancer and he told me that he was really perhaps only 50% of what he was before his injury. He was one of the very first people to receive high-dose methyprednisolone in 1981.

Other examples of "walking quads" include Dennis Byrd, Reggie Brown, and others. Incidentally, many people who become walking quads are not grossly incomplete on admission to the hospital. One person that I knew recently, a young woman who broke her neck falling off a horse, had received methylprednisolone within an hour after injury. Her father thought that she had some sensation in one leg but, by the time she got to the hospital, she was unable to move anything. Over 3 months, she recovered remarkably, to the point that she walked around everywhere with just a cane.

"Walking paras" are more rare, in my experience. Part of the reason may be the forces that are necessary to produce a thoracic spinal cord injury may be much greater.

Wise.

[Chris Chappell]

Congratulations, awesome news!

Onward and Upward!