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American Morning

Real Life Superman

Aired September 10, 2002 - 09:54   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: We are following the story, news from overnight that apparently actor Christopher Reeve has some movement in his fingers and toes, and our Dr. Sanjay Gupta has been working the phone this morning, talking with his doctor, finding out more about this, and the progress that may have made at this point.
Sanjay, what did you find out?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: good morning, Bill. This is pretty exciting stuff. No question, everyone has been following the story of Christopher Reeve since six and a half years ago when he fell off that horse and broke the upper top two bones in his neck, leading to sort of immediate paralysis. He has been undergoing significant physical therapy since that time, spending close to half a million dollars of his own money to actually undergo some of this stuff.

The exciting thing, Bill, now is that almost seven years later, they are starting to see new improvements, some new movement, specifically movement in his left fingers, some movement in his right hand, and his left toes. In addition, he was previously on the ventilator all the time. He is now able to stay off the ventilator for 90 minutes at a time. The actor has also said that the greatest sort of improvement has been in the fact that he can actually feel things now that he previously couldn't feel. Pins and needles at times, but also being able to feel a human touch, which is all sort of new stuff.

I did speak to the doctor. Certainly, this is very encouraging. Although while it sounds pretty small, in terms of overall improvements, it is encouraging, because there really is very little recovery that usually occurs after first 18 months after a spinal cord jury.

As I pointed out, Bill, six and half years later, we are starting to see some improvement. Hard to see what that means for the future for Christopher Reeve, but certainly a sort of great, big thing for him.

HEMMER: Sanjay, in about 15 seconds, if you can here, do you know of any stories, any cases similar to his, where a person really did regain full movement, the ability to walk?

GUPTA: No, we don't know of any. In fact, Bill, the fact that he has had this much improvement at seven years is very unusual, maybe an isolated case in and of itself.

HEMMER: All right, Sanjay, thanks.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta working that story for us.

GUPTA: It's good seeing you, Bill.

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