Our Get a Grip clinical trial has officially gone global after opening its first international trial site at Rope Neuro Rehabilitation in New Zealand at the end of October – giving spinal injured New Zealanders the opportunity to participate in the ground-breaking trial.
Get a Grip is a community-based exercise trial designed for individuals with complete or incomplete quadriplegia. It involves targeted breathing training, as well as hand and arm exercises with the use of spinal cord electrical stimulation — all aimed at enhancing respiratory and upper limb function. The study is a vital part of our neurostimulation research collaborative, Project Spark, in partnership with Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA) , The CatWalk Trust, Spinal Cord Injuries Australia and Forward Ability Support. All Project Spark clinical trials including Get a Grip use non-invasive neurostimulation via electrodes placed onto the skin. This enhances the function of the spinal cord by sending electrical pulses into nerves around the injury, facilitating communication between brain and body through surviving neural pathways.
Although its population is much smaller in comparison to neighbouring Australia, New Zealand has one of the highest rates of spinal cord injury (SCI) in the western world with over 200 new SCIs reported each year – resulting in significant rehabilitation and hospital costs. In light of these statistics, Julie Rope, Senior Physiotherapist and Director at Rope Neuro Rehabilitation said that Get a Grip was a welcome addition to the SCI community.
“It’s great to have Get a Grip available to our clients here at Rope Neuro Rehabilitation,” she said. “It really offers them the best of two worlds – giving them access to an intensive rehabilitation program while also seeking to solve a research question to determine the therapeutic benefits of neurostimulation not only from a hand function perspective, but respiratory as well,” she added.
With one participant having completed the trial in late November, Julie said that they have a further two lined up to start early in 2025 and hopes to have a total of five completed by mid next year. Rope Neuro Rehabilitation also has plans to start recruiting participants for eWALK2 in 2025, another SCI clinical trial that forms part of the Project Spark collaboration.
“It’s very early days but we’re already seeing positive results,” continued Julie. “Our first Get a Grip participant, a 25 year old who makes wooden boards for a living, experienced good hand function benefits. In particular, his ability to release an item with his hand improved greatly. This was originally rated a score of three at the start of the trial but went up to a seven at the end, which was really pleasing to see,” she explained.
“From a clinical point of view, it’s also been great to have the opportunity to utilise spinal stimulation modality and for all of our therapists, including our junior staff, to have exposure to it and learn how to apply it in a real-world setting.”
According to Dr Boswell-Ruys, Senior Research Fellow at NeuRA’s Spinal Cord Injury Research Centre (SCIRC), who led the training for Rope’s team of therapists alongside Research Fellow Dr Terry Trinh, Get a Grip’s expansion to New Zealand marks a significant milestone in Project Spark’s journey.
“The beauty of Get a Grip is the design of the trial, which essentially gives the SCI community greater access to participate,” explained Dr Boswell-Ruys. “A key part of that has been setting up satellite trial sites in collaboration with community-based rehabilitation providers so it has been great to be able to expand the net further, to include New Zealand and work with the team at Rope Neuro Rehabilitation, to make this happen,” she added. “We are excited to work with Rope’s clinical therapists and the community in New Zealand to gather more valuable data that will help us understand the potential that neurostimulation has as a possible therapy for SCI.”
Watch this space as we prepare to launch more Project Spark clinical trial sites in Perth, Sydney and regional NSW in 2025.