Effect of epidural spinal cord stimulation combined with personalized neurorehabilitation in chronic motor-complete spinal cord injury: study protocol for the phase II single-arm feasibility RESTORES (RESToration Of Rehabilitative function with Epidural spinal Stimulation) trial

Background

Chronic motor-complete spinal cord injury (SCI) results in profound neurological disability with minimal prospects for functional recovery using conventional rehabilitation strategies. Emerging evidence suggests that epidural spinal cord stimulation (eSCS) can activate dormant spinal locomotor networks and restore volitional and autonomic functions when combined with intensive activity-based training. However, systematic evaluation of multimodal neuromodulation approaches integrating advanced rehabilitation and computational neurophysiology remains limited.