Inching towards a dream

Oct 24 2002 By Jane Hall, The Journal

When Clarence Adoo left the spinal injuries unit in Sheffield six months after being paralysed from the shoulders down in a car crash, he was bluntly told by a doctor: "Sorry, this is as good as it gets."

The trumpet player could only move his head an inch from side-to-side and it took him 20 minutes to turn a page using an implement he held in his mouth.

But seven years on, he is gaining much satisfaction from proving that unidentified medic wrong.

Sensations and muscles the experts said had been destroyed forever are slowly coming back to life. He can now shrug his shoulders; the feeling has returned to the upper half of his left arm, which he can lift into the air; muscles that had lain dormant are beginning to spasm; and his head swivels normally on his neck.

For an able-bodied person, this progress may seem little to shout about. But for Clarence, confined to an electric wheelchair and needing round-the-clock care, it offers hope that he may one day fulfil his dream to take to the stage again with Tyneside's Northern Sinfonia.

If this happens, the 42-year-old will have his own steely determination coupled with the pioneering Biofeedback treatment he has been receiving in America to thank.

Since April 1998, he has made three trips to Miami's Jackson Medical Centre - at a cost of £30,000 - where sophisticated computer software is used to test if brain signals are reaching his muscles.

"On my first visit I had very little movement except for a small amount in my left shoulder," Clarence explains. "I was told if I was to go home and do rigorous exercises on this left arm, that within a year I could get to a point where I could lift this arm off the armrest of my wheelchair.

"I wasn't sure how much of this I could believe. I came back and said to my team of carers, `the proof is in the pudding'.

"After about nine months the movement got stronger and I was able to lift my arm about three inches off the armrest. This has now developed and I can lift my elbow nearly level with my shoulder.

"On the second visit it was thought if I began to exercise in a different area of the arm I could start to get some biceps flexion and from the shoulder I could start to move the arm forward and back.

"Again I came home and did the exercises - and it's worked.

"On my last visit at Easter they were interested in a message that was getting from my brain to my left wrist and fingers. At the moment I only have feeling to my elbow, but things are happening that I didn't know about.

"When I was asked to grasp a tennis ball I couldn't do it, but the reflex was there. They also said that information is starting to get through to the top part of my right arm. Movement is building all the time in this area and if the signal was to increase, that would be a huge increase in my mobility which could start to change my life."

It was at 4.10pm on August 19, 1995, that the car he was driving to his brother's stag night overturned on the A1 somewhere near Retford. Asleep in the front passenger seat was Emma Forbes, Northern Sinfonia's marketing and PR assistant.

Clarence can recall the accident in slow motion action replay - the car veering to the left, straightening out on the hard shoulder, shooting over a bank and somersaulting a couple of times.

Clarence was conscious throughout and remembers asking Emma if she was all right and being relieved when she replied. A fellow motorist, who turned out to be a doctor, asked if they could move their limbs.

"I wasn't able to move anything but I assumed I'd broken my arms and legs. I wasn't in any particular panic," Clarence says.

The pair were cut free, taken to hospital in Bassetlaw and later transferred to the spinal injuries unit in Sheffield.

Emma has made a full recovery. Clarence, however, was not so lucky.

As a young man he had dreamt of being the best trumpeter in the world - until, he will tell you with a smile, he heard Wynton Marsalis play and realised he would have to settle for second best.

Now his talented and brilliantly tutored hands lie dormant on his knees, his trumpet-playing days over.

A lesser person would have sunk into the depths of despair.

But Clarence, bolstered by his Christian faith and a courage few people possess, has refused to be anything other than cheerful and optimistic about his future.

Talking in the living room of his specially-adapted home in Jesmond, Newcastle, he says: "As soon as I left hospital, in my mind I was determined to start fighting - to improve my situation.

"When I dream, I have never dreamt of seeing myself in a wheelchair and deep down I do think there will come a time when I will play the trumpet again. In my mind I still do the fingering."

It would be a fool who would doubt this could happen. Against the odds he has returned to work with Northern Sinfonia in an administrative post, thanks to the help of modern technology.

By sucking and blowing down a tube attached to an infra-red box on his wheelchair he is able to answer the telephone, switch on the radio, video and hi-fi, open the front door to his home, travel upstairs in a lift and switch on the lights.

And with the help of a beam from a head-set he can also use a computer. "To still be involved in music is such a spur in my life," he says.

"Music has been such a large part of my life ever since I learnt the trumpet when I was in the Salvation Army at the age of six.

"When I was in hospital it was music that helped me deal with feelings and emotions; that and my Christian faith."

Clarence shows a complete lack of bitterness as he speaks. And while his fight for mobility continues, he accepts he is luckier than some.

He also accepts that he is fortunate to have friends who have rallied round to raise money for the Clarence Adoo Trust, which helps meet his £1,000-a-week care service costs and his treatment in America.

His fightback mirrors that of Superman actor Christopher Reeve, who has regained some movement in his arms and legs after severely damaging his spinal cord in a riding accident seven years ago.

Reeve hasn't been following the same treatment programme as Clarence because he is still dependent on a ventilator to breathe. But in an interview with People magazine recently he said he could now feel the hugs he gets from his wife and children and added: "To be able to feel the lightest touch is really a gift."

Clarence understands how he feels. "Every small thing is a big thing, so he would be very optimistic that this is the start of something bigger."

But he has a word of warning. "I think everybody is willing Christopher Reeve on, so much so it is easy to misinterpret some of the progress that is going on. All the time I am improving, but I have been told that my recovery could end tomorrow."

Like Reeve he does believe that science could offer a cure. "Medicine is moving quicker than I am." He is in two minds as to whether he would take a drastic route, however. "I couldn't say I wouldn't, but these days I think it would be equally frightening if I was to be cured this afternoon.

"It took me four years to cope with the major change the accident made to my life and it would take some time to go back the other way. There is a fear almost of the unknown, and there is a certain comfort level now.

"People are used to me as I am and I am used to the way I operate."

* The Clarence Adoo Trust will be holding a concert at the Salvation Army, Westgate Road, Newcastle, on November 1 at 7.30pm. Performers will include the Dunston Silver Band, Northern Divisional Youth Chorus, The Palatinate Ensemble, Newcastle City Temple Band and the Acting Up drama group. Tickets cost £3 and £2 on the door.