Breakthrough nerve transfer surgery restores use of arms to quadriplegic patients in Montreal

A young woman with quadriplegia has restored more mobility in her arms and hands thanks to a breakthrough surgery by a pair of Montreal doctors.

Jeanne Carriere is one of about a dozen patients to undergo a nerve transfer procedure at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital (MRH).

Carriere fell and broke her neck in December, 2021. When she woke up after the incident, she found herself almost completely paralyzed. She could lift her arms, but her hands were clamped shut.

Months into her recovery, she says, she was brought in for an interview with the surgeons responsible for the mobility surgery. She said the meeting felt like a job interview.

“What do you want to do with your hands?” she recounted them asking her. She responded to say she wanted to work. Before her accident, she worked as a screenwriter, and getting back to her “dream job” pulled her through her extended recovery.s

“He said, ‘I think we can do something for you,’” she remembered. Some time after, her surgery was booked.

In a demonstration for CTV News, Carrier reviewed the marks left by the surgery – a few scars on her arms are the only visible artifacts, until she starts to move.

“My brain gives the message to my elbow to squeeze,” said Carriere, holding her arm out.

“But since the nerve for my elbow was put in my thumb, it’s doing that,” she said, as her thumb and index finder started to move.

“Science!” she said, with a laugh.

Jeanne Carrière prepares for nerve-transplant surgery at the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital to restore use of her arms and hands. (CIUSSS de l'Est-de-l'Île-de-Montréal)

OPEN TO THE PUBLIC SOON 

The work was carried out by plastic surgeons Dominique Tremblay and Élie Boghossian.

"In the quadriplegic patient, we replace the nerve impulses of a nerve that does not work with a nerve that still works. With time and rehabilitation, the nerve impulse is reformed, and the use of the hands and arms gradually returns," said Dr. Tremblay Thursday in a press release.

Now, the life-changing procedure is moving past the development stage at MRH and will become available to the general public.

While the surgery is performed at a handful of hospitals around the world, this is the first time it's being offered in Quebec.

Jean-François Fortin Verreault, president of and CEO of the regional health board that oversees MRH, said the news is "the result of years of extremely rigorous collaborative work." 

Carriere says she's still in the early stages of her recovery, and that "the best is yet to come."

After seven months of therapy, she expects to build mor mobility in her hands over the course of the two-year program. 

"It’s a beautiful thing," she said. "I was able to imagine myself in a wheelchair, and not being able to walk, but my hands, that is too important for me. That’s my independence."

"It's being able to cook, eat by myself, brush my teeth, put my makeup on," she said.

She says she's also been able to return to work after gaining enough dexterity to use her computer or a pen to take notes. 

"It’s a beautiful gift that they gave to me."

-- With files from CTV Quebec Bureau Chief Genevieve Beauchemin