Title: Paralyzed steelworker progresses / Up lifting story 4 us
Dec. 28, 2005
By Jon Seidel / Post-Tribune staff writer
WESTVILLE — His body ailing but his spirit willing, Tony Arciniega returned to work at Mittal Steel full-time in October.
Now in a wheelchair, his work is not the same, but he and his family haven’t given up on healing his body.
“We’re hoping,” Sarah Arciniega, Tony’s wife, said. “We’re praying.”
Tony Arciniega fell from a ladder “almost on his head” while working at the International Steel Group’s Burns Harbor plant in November 2004. He has been paralyzed ever since.
However, things have gotten better after he took part in an experimental surgery performed by a company based in Israel, Sarah Arciniega said.
Though he hasn’t regained what most people would think of as “feeling,” she said, he does feel pressure lower on his body than he did before.
“If he sits in the chair too long he can feel a deep pressure,” Sarah Arciniega said.
Within two weeks after the injury, Sarah Arciniega said her husband was flown to New York City to undergo a new procedure to treat acute paralysis patients. It was recommended to them by their doctor in Valparaiso.
The procedure, performed by Proneuron Biotechnologies, had to happen within two weeks of Arciniega’s injury.
“They had to get everything going,” Sarah Arciniega said.
Proneuron is now three-fourths of the way through a second phase of clinical human trials, said Dale Miller, executive chairman of the company.
In an editorial in the September issue of the Journal of Neurosurgery: Spine, the results of the first phase, which included about 10 patients, were said to represent “a small although potentially promising” study.
“We’re passionate about these diseases,” Miller said. “These have a very profound impact on people’s lives.”
People like Tony Arciniega who undergo the procedure have immune cells called “macrophages” taken out of their body. Essentially, those cells are taught how to heal the central nervous system.
After a few days, those cells are injected into the spinal cord.
“Right below the area of injury,” Sarah Arciniega said.
All of this is done under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Miller said.
Tony Arciniega’s wife suspects he might not have made the progress he has made if it weren’t for Proneuron’s procedure.
“We’re doing so well,” Sarah Arciniega said. “I’m so proud of him.”
That, Miller said, is part of the goal.
“We’re optimistic,” Miller said. “We’re continuing to move forward to try and find a meaningful therapy.”
In the meantime, Sarah Arciniega has been thanking the people in their Westville community for helping her husband during a difficult year.
“Everybody’s still helpful,” Sarah Arciniega said. “They’ll still call us. It’s all the time. It’s just been amazing how everybody’s stepped in to help.”
Contact Jon Seidel at 477-6015 or [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more information: www.proneuron.com
