ABSTRACT
The authors’ aim has been to develop a generic FES implant for the restoration of functions in spinal cord injured (SCI) paraplegic individuals, the functions or modes of which can be matched to an individual’s requirements: Upright Functional Mobility, Pressure Relief and Lower Extremity Exercise, Bladder and Bowel Control [1-6]. In addition, for bladder control, less invasive surgical procedures were proposed to avoid posterior conus rhizotomy, and sacral laminotomy in order to access the sacral nerve roots for stimulation [7, 8]. The hope was that this system would offer more functions and less surgery to patients with a cost-benefit ratio. This approach was termed “multifunctional.”
