By JACK THURSTON, NECN
Published: Wednesday, May 28, 2014
View the original article here.
The Travis Roy Foundation and Fletcher Allen Health Care announced the donation of advanced stair climbing equipment for the inpatient rehabilitation facility located at the hospital’s Fanny Allen campus in Colchester, Vermont. The Dynamic Stair Trainer, as it is known, is adjustable, and will be used to assist patients taking their first steps again after suffering a stroke, injury, or other physical or neurological problem.
The foundation helped provide the unit with most of the money it needed to purchase the $17,000 device, the hospital said. “It’s nice for us to be able to give a piece of equipment that will help an array of patients,” Travis Roy told New England Cable News.
Roy is the promising Boston University hockey player who, just 11 seconds into his first collegiate game in 1995, became paralyzed following a freak accident on the ice. While the injury rendered him a quadriplegic, it did not detract from his desire to live an active, fulfilling, and productive life.
In 1997, Roy and supporters launched the Travis Roy Foundation. It supports spinal cord injury research and provides grants to assist recently-paralyzed people. One of the foundation’s major fundraisers is held every summer at a scale replica of Fenway Park in Essex, Vermont. That WIFFLE Ball tournament raised more than a half-million dollars last year alone.
“It’s going to help thousands of people moving forward,” said Dr. Roger Knakal, the medical director of Fletcher Allen’s rehabilitation medicine program, describing the acquisition of the new therapy device.
Knakal said Roy’s grant will help replace less stable wooden steps therapists had been using with patients. He said us the machine’s ability to tailor treatment by raising or lowering the height of steps to match a person’s ability level will likely help get people out of bed sooner, speeding their return home. “Early mobility is important. It’s good not only from a medical standpoint–it helps decrease complications–but it also helps an individual return to a better quality of life,” Knakal explained.
Travis Roy said he is confident from what he’s seen in the world of spinal cord injury research, that doctors in coming years and decades will make big breakthroughs to improve mobility for many. “There’s going to be a lot of people with spinal cord injuries, who, through new therapies, are going to be able to walk again,” Roy predicted.
The Travis Roy foundation and Franciscan Hospital for Children are organizing a fundraising WIFFLE Ball tournament at Boston University’s Nickerson Field on June 21. The Vermont tournament is scheduled for August 15-17.
The Vermont fundraiser is expanding this year, with the addition of a new field to owner Pat O’Connor’s property. In addition to Little Fenway and a miniature version of Chicago’s Wrigley Field, players will also compete on a “Little Field of Dreams.” It is a replica of the Iowa field from the movie “Field of Dreams,” O’Connor and Roy said.
