Life-changing surgery allows Quebec woman paralyzed from chest down to use hands again

At her home in Lachute, Que., Jeanne Carrière pulls her wheelchair up to the kitchen counter and cuts an apple into slices. For Carrière, this is a big deal — she's using her hands in a way she never thought she would again.

Carrière, who's quadriplegic, had been unable to use her hands or lower body after breaking her neck in 2021. While she had been able to regain some movement in her arms, that wasn't the case for her hands.

But in July 2022, she underwent surgery at Montreal's Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital that has given her back some of what she lost.

The 27-year-old screenwriter now lives in a ground-floor apartment below her parents' home that's adapted to her physical needs.

Carrière said the first time she saw her fingers move on their own after the surgery was like watching "a child with their first step."

"It was the first step into my new life."

Two surgeons and two teams of medical staff worked for nine hours, each focused on a different arm. It was captured on camera by Radio-Canada's science program, Découverte.

The goal of the surgery, known as a nerve transfer, was to connect some of Carrière's nerves that still worked to those that were no longer communicating with her brain due to her damaged spinal cord.

"Basically we are rerouting the nerves and bringing new electrical input to these denervated muscles," said Dr. Elie Boghossian, one of the surgeons who operated on Carrière.

The doctors opened Carrière's arms and located nerves still communicating with the brain that begin above the injury to her spinal cord. Under a microscope, they connected them to the non-functioning nerves further down, below the injury, using sutures finer than human hair.

The rehabilitation process following surgery helps teach the brain to follow the new nerve paths instead of the old ones. Building that plasticity takes time.

"With time, the patient gets function back and mobility, eventually," Boghossian said.

While that function may be limited to small hand movements such as pinching and grasping, for Carrière and other patients, it's crucial because it gives them back some independence.

"Now it's unbelievable what my hands can do," Carrière said. "I can brush my teeth, I can cook."