A computer-controlled device that fits around the leg of stroke victim is helping speed the physical rehabilitation of patients as they relearn how to walk. 

“I feel like I should be in the ‘Matrix’ movies,” one patient joked.

With the assistance of the device she walked up and down stairs at UCSF Mission Bay’s fitness center with remarkable fluidity.

“Usually I would stumble and my foot would be dragging,” Hoy said. “I feel like I’m working muscles I’ve been shying away from.”

The Tibion Bionic Leg has been named a winner in the 2010 Medical Design Excellence Awards (MDEA) competition at the Medical Design & Manufacturing East 2010 Conference and Exposition

(READ the story in the San Francisco Chronicle)

Millions worldwide die each year because they can’t afford a pacemaker. Meanwhile, heart patients in the United States say they’d be willing to donate theirs after death to someone in need.

In this week’s issue of Circulation, experts at the University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center described the legality and logistics of collecting pacemakers, for reuse across the globe, and unveiled a new program to do just that.

They assert that humanitarian efforts so far have shown reuse of pacemakers to be safe and effective with little risk of infection. In fact, patients live as long with a recycled pacemaker as those who get new ones, authors say.