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46 °F 5 Day Forecast Sunday, November 30, 2003 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | eSouthernOregon | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find a Rental Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Email Story to a Friend October 26, 2003 With the support of his mother, Rita, and sister, Krista, at left, Kyle Marci has worked hard to overcome the effects of a brain injury suffered in an automobile accident. Mail Tribune / Roy Musitelli Hanging on to HOPE There is more potential now for recovery from brain damage than the medical community has ever imagined By BILL KETTLER Mail Tribune Kyle Marci knows he’s lucky to be alive. That’s not always enough, especially when you’re 17. Kyle can walk a few steps on his own now, 18 months after an accident left him partially paralyzed from a traumatic brain injury. But his sense of balance is still unsteady and his coordination is impaired. He speaks slowly, and sometimes has to reach for words. Kyle wants to be who he was before the crash. The other Kyle was an honor student and a wrestler at Crater High School in spring 2002. On a sunny April afternoon, he was on his way home from school to Sams Valley with three friends in a Honda Prelude. Advertisement The driver lost control on a patch of gravel on Upton Road. The little Honda flipped three times, then smashed into a brick wall. Firefighters had to cut Kyle out of the back seat of the crumpled car. People who saw the mangled Honda said they’d never seen a wreck that looked so bad where somebody didn’t die. Kyle remembers nothing about the accident. His doctors know his head struck something hard and unyielding — maybe a steel roof pillar — probably when the car smashed into the brick wall. The impact jarred his brain and short-circuited parts of his nervous system. Doctors inserted a tube in his throat, put him on a ventilator to help him breathe and fed him intravenously. They couldn’t say when — or if — he would wake up, let alone recover. The answers were buried deep within his brain. "When you’re going at a fast speed and come to a fast stop, the brain travels forward in the skull," says Dr. Cornelia Byers, one of Kyle’s physicians. "The brain twists on the membranes that hold it in place in the skull. The nerves twist and the connections between the nerves separate." After five weeks in a coma, Kyle woke up in a hospital bed, partially paralyzed on his right side. "The best way I can tell it is like this," he says, talking with visitors on a warm October day 18 months after the accident. "You know how it feels when you’re a little kid and you’re staying at your friend’s house and you wake up and you don’t know where you are? It was about 100 times worse." His speech was slurred then, and he couldn’t coordinate the muscles in his arms, legs and trunk. "We wondered whether we were going to get the real Kyle back," says his mom, Rita. Kyle came home in a wheelchair after 32 days in intensive care and 75 days in the hospital. After months of daily exercise and regular physical therapy, Kyle has impressed his doctors with his progress. Byers says Kyle’s athletic training as a wrestler and strong support from his family already have carried him further than many others might have gone. "Family support is critical," she says. "Kyle probably wouldn’t have done so well if he hadn’t set his mind to it. He knew it takes hard work." The wrestler and his family want more. "We just keep thinking there’s one thing that would make it all better," his mother says. Not so long ago, doctors would have been pessimistic about Kyle’s chances for further recovery. These days, researchers are learning more about the brain, and physicians have thrown out many of their old notions about traumatic brain injury and a host of other brain ailments — everything from Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis to Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord damage and stroke. "We know now there’s more potential (for recovery) in the brain and spinal cord than we ever imagined," Byers says. Scientists have discovered the brain’s ability to reassign and rewire tasks (what researchers call "plasticity") persists far longer than they once thought. Physicians used to think the brain lost its plasticity during childhood, Byers says, "but what we know now blows all that apart." "We used to say you’d see all you’re going to see in 12 months after traumatic brain injury," she says. "Nowadays people say you’ve got to wait three to five years." Researchers are trying to find out how to do a better job of helping the brain rewire itself, says Dr. Dennis Bourdette, acting chairman of the neurology department at Oregon Health & Science University. Some are using magnetic waves to try to stimulate brain tissue. Others are studying stem-cell transplants as a potential source of new nerve cells; chemicals in the brain that stimulate cell growth; and drugs that could help repair nerve damage. Bourdette says all of those projects offer some hope for people recovering from traumatic brain injury, but it could be 10 years before they’re available. In the meantime, Kyle keeps working with his weights, riding his exercycle, and sitting on a big rubber ball, rebuilding his coordination and sense of balance. He wants to be on his own two feet next spring when he gets his high school diploma. "I want to walk for graduation," he says. "That’s my big goal." Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2003 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions Website Feedback 3 WEEKS FREE! ADVERTISERS SPECIAL SECTIONS Auto Finder Job Finder Home Finder Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Tempo Real Estate Showcase Food for Thought Hike of the Week Wellness Connection Outdoor Journal Moving to Southern Oregon? Volunteer Openings Prime Times