About the
SCI Center
Overview
The National Rehabilitation Hospital (NRH) is
pleased to announce the establishment of the NRH Rehabilitation
Research and Training Center (RRTC) on Secondary Conditions in Individuals
with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI), a five-year project federally funded/supported
by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research
(NIDRR), a division of the United States Department of Education.
The designation of the NRH RRTC by NIDRR provides a $4 million grant
over a 5-year period and allows NRH to further extend its research
and training efforts.
The RRTC on Secondary Conditions in Individuals
with SCI will be launched in December, 2003, and will consist of
a unique collaborative effort of national leaders in SCI-related
research, clinical expertise, support and education organizations,
independent living centers, and consumers with SCI. The collaborative
effort will team NRH clinicians and researchers with other experts
in the field from:
- University of Miami School of Medicine/Miami
Project to Cure Paralysis
- Independent Living Resource Utilization at
The Institute for Rehabilitation and Research
- National Spinal Cord Injury Association
- Spinal Cord Injury Network
The focus of this RRTC is on further development
of knowledge about and/or prevention of selected secondary conditions.
The primary conditions studied will be cardiovascular disease and
osteoporosis, although a wide range of other secondary conditions,
such as respiratory dysfunction, urinary tract infection, depression,
and pain, as well as quality of life, will be examined. We will
also more intensely and specifically examine the effect of exercise
as a means to prevent certain secondary conditions after SCI.
While five of the projects planned through the
RRTC will focus on knowledge about and/or prevention of selected
secondary conditions that occur throughout the lifetime of an individual
after incurring an SCI, four additional projects will focus on
training. A unique element of the
training component is that consumers with SCI will be involved
extensively throughout the spectrum of research, including but
not necessarily limited to peer mentoring of individuals with both
acute and more chronic SCI, as well as in the education of health
care professionals, legislators, and others in SCI-related fields.
National Rehabilitation Hospital's Director of
Spinal Cord Injury Research, Dr. Suzanne Groah, will be contributing
her expertise as the Center Director, as well as leading the effort
for several of the research projects. Thilo Kroll, PhD, a senior
research associate at the NRH Center for Health and Disability Research,
will bring his experience in the area of Participatory Action Training
and Participatory Action Research through his leadership of the
training projects and will also serve as Co-Principal Investigator
for the Center.
We are very excited about the potential
impact of knowledge gained from activities in this RRTC directly
on individuals with SCI, as well as for a broad range of others
who are involved in the care and/or lives of individuals with SCI.
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