Page 10 - Mobility Management, August 2017

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Research & Discoveries
Study: Wheelchair Rugby Reduces Depression Risk in SCI Patients
Wheelchair rugby, known for its raucous, full-contact play, has now also been associated with significantly reduced risk for depression in people who have spinal cord injury (SCI).
A new University of Houston project studied 150 people with SCI who also played wheelchair rugby regularly. In a news announcement, researchers said just 17 percent of the athletes in the study had symptoms of depression. Overall, about half of people with SCI also report symp- toms of depression.
Researchers also found that athletes who practiced wheelchair rugby more regularly (twice or more a week) were at lower risk of depression than those who prac- ticed once a week or less.
Lead author Stephanie Silveira, a graduate student at the University of Houston, said of wheelchair rugby, “It’s such a unique sport, and there’s so much camaraderie
where participants come together in a safe environment with people just like them. Teammates help each other not only with how to play, but with life skills as well.”
Researcher Daphne Hernandez, a University of Houston assistant professor who worked on the study, added, “Participating in multiple wheelchair sports can be really expensive, so that’s not feasible for some. The great finding with this study is you can still have great results playing one sport two times a week. We met men who were totally transformed by playing the sport.”
The study was funded by Houston-based TIRR Memorial Hermann, a rehabilitation facility that treats a number of conditions, including spinal cord injury, brain injury and stroke. University of Houston Assistant Professor Michael Cottingham and Associate Professor Tracy Ledoux were also on the research team. Research find- ings were published in the journal Spinal Cord in May. m
Researchers: Measuring Patients’ Neurofilaments Can Speed ALS Diagnosis
Belgian researchers say measuring neurofilaments could help to confirm the presence of amyotrophic lateral scle- rosis (ALS) more quickly.
Currently, ALS can be difficult to diagnose, especially at onset. Researchers at the Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology in Belgium noted in a news announcement that ALS often takes a year to diagnose — a critically long time for a disease with a life expec- tancy of two to five years after first symptoms are seen.
Flanders Interuniversity Institute researchers, along with colleagues at the University of Jena in Germany, now say that measuring a patient’s neurofilaments could help to confirm an ALS diagnosis.
In the announcement, Philip Van Damme, professor at Flanders Interuniversity Institute who was involved in the study, said, “Despite the severity of the disease, an ALS diagnosis relies heavily on the physician’s clinical acuity. The typical disease progression of ALS, with the loss of strength extending from one body region to another, allows a definite diagnosis. In the early stages of the
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disease, diagnosis is difficult. Consequently, the average time between the first symptoms and diagnosis is approx- imately one year. Better tests are needed for a faster diagnosis, which we hope to achieve with this test.”
Researchers explained that neurofilaments are “structural proteins in the cytoskeleton, present in high concentrations in motor neurons. It has been known for a long time that the lumbar fluid in ALS patients contains a higher concentration of neurofilaments, perhaps because they are released from sick motor neurons.”
Koen Poesen, professor at the University of Leuven, Belgium, said, “We have demonstrated that a certain type of neurofilament (pNfH, phosphorylated neurofilament heavy) in particular increases sharply in the lumbar
fluid of ALS patients. This is even true when compared
to patients presenting loss of strength symptoms due to other conditions (known as ALS mimics). The test meets the requirements for use as a reliable diagnostic test. However, it requires an epidural because we can still only reliably measure neurofilaments in the lumbar fluid.” m
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