NIH NICHHD Funding Awarded to Dr. Ela Plow

Congratulations to Ela Plow, PhD who recently received a National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHHD) award titled Contralaterally Controlled FES Combined with Brain Stimulation for Severe Upper Limb Hemiplegia. This is a 5-year, $3.1M project to test the ability of a combination of novel therapies to restore arm and hand function in patients with upper limb paralysis following a stroke. The approach combines a novel rehabilitation therapy with a new method of brain stimulation that targets the intact/uninjured hemisphere. Current techniques targeting the injured hemisphere are less effective for patients with more extensive paralysis. This is the first study that aims to enhance the activity of the intact hemisphere using noninvasive brain stimulation.