He was young, full of energy and would say yes to pretty much anything you asked him to do.
He worked two jobs, full time at CDL Electric and for the Frontenac Police Department, all while attending Labette Community College in Parsons.
He was a go-getter — always on the move.
“Trying to be Superman,” is how Justin Pryor described himself.
But on the foggy morning of Oct. 14, 2008, fatigue proved to be Pryor’s Kryptonite.
“I was coming home one morning at about 6 a.m., going to get ready for work,” Pryor said. “I drifted off to sleep.”
The accident report from the Crawford County Sheriff’s Office said Pryor’s truck entered the east ditch on 260th Street south of Highway 160, which must have woken Pryor up because he then “overcorrected and careened into the west ditch.” The truck rolled several times before striking a power pole.
Pryor, who was not wearing a seat belt, was thrown from the truck and landed 60 feet away. The 2001 Girard High School graduate suffered a broken neck and T12 vertebrate. Alone, drifting in and out of consciousness, and paralyzed from the waist down, Pryor screamed for help — and screamed for help and screamed for help. Eventually, a Fort Scott man named Clay Campbell found him and called for medical assistance.
“That man is my guardian angel,” Pryor said of Campbell, who could not be reached for comment.
Immediately following the accident, Pryor was transported to Mt. Carmel Regional Medical Center and later to Freeman Hospital in Joplin. The doctors did all they could, but the damage was done. Pryor was told it was likely he would never walk again. Pryor, who was 25 at the time, took the news and reacted the only way he knew how — he turned a negative into a positive.
“I got a whole new perspective on life,” he said. “Life goes by so fast. But when you’re in a situation like this, days feel like weeks and weeks feel like years. My day starts at 8 or 9 a.m. and it lasts forever. You really start to notice the small things in life and take nothing for granted.
“You find out what life’s all about.”
That’s not to say, however, that Pryor is content to spend his life in a wheelchair. Quite the opposite, actually. He’s fighting this thing with all he’s got, and he’s determined to win —even if the key to victory sits halfway around the world.
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He was young, full of energy and would say yes to pretty much anything you asked him to do.
He worked two jobs, full time at CDL Electric and for the Frontenac Police Department, all while attending Labette Community College in Parsons.
He was a go-getter — always on the move.
“Trying to be Superman,” is how Justin Pryor described himself.
But on the foggy morning of Oct. 14, 2008, fatigue proved to be Pryor’s Kryptonite.
“I was coming home one morning at about 6 a.m., going to get ready for work,” Pryor said. “I drifted off to sleep.”
The accident report from the Crawford County Sheriff’s Office said Pryor’s truck entered the east ditch on 260th Street south of Highway 160, which must have woken Pryor up because he then “overcorrected and careened into the west ditch.” The truck rolled several times before striking a power pole.
Pryor, who was not wearing a seat belt, was thrown from the truck and landed 60 feet away. The 2001 Girard High School graduate suffered a broken neck and T12 vertebrate. Alone, drifting in and out of consciousness, and paralyzed from the waist down, Pryor screamed for help — and screamed for help and screamed for help. Eventually, a Fort Scott man named Clay Campbell found him and called for medical assistance.
“That man is my guardian angel,” Pryor said of Campbell, who could not be reached for comment.
Immediately following the accident, Pryor was transported to Mt. Carmel Regional Medical Center and later to Freeman Hospital in Joplin. The doctors did all they could, but the damage was done. Pryor was told it was likely he would never walk again. Pryor, who was 25 at the time, took the news and reacted the only way he knew how — he turned a negative into a positive.
“I got a whole new perspective on life,” he said. “Life goes by so fast. But when you’re in a situation like this, days feel like weeks and weeks feel like years. My day starts at 8 or 9 a.m. and it lasts forever. You really start to notice the small things in life and take nothing for granted.
“You find out what life’s all about.”
That’s not to say, however, that Pryor is content to spend his life in a wheelchair. Quite the opposite, actually. He’s fighting this thing with all he’s got, and he’s determined to win —even if the key to victory sits halfway around the world.
‘Tired of being like this’
While his son, now a partial paraplegic, was lying in a hospital bed unable to move his legs, Chester Pryor asked the doctor “point blank” if Justin would ever walk again. The doctor, he said, didn’t say yes, but she also didn’t say no.
“She told me flat out that the odds are stacked against him,” Chester said. “I said to her, ‘Doctor, no disrespect, but we’ll take those odds and we’ll beat those odds.”
So far, they have. After extensive rehabilitation efforts and shock therapy, Justin has regained some control of both of his legs. And although his feet “don’t work at all,” he can walk a little with the help of leg braces. For the most part, however, he is confined to a wheelchair — which is pure hell for a guy who hates having things done for him.
“I never depended on anyone my entire life,” he said. “It kills me that I have to depend on people now.”
Chester said his son’s biggest problem is patience — more precisely, his lack of patience.
“Before the accident, this kid did not understand the word patience,” the father said. “That was one of the things I knew was going to be the hardest for him.”
Justin said he’s been told that if he continues with his rehabilitation procedures and continues his therapy regimen, he may be able to regain enough control of his lower limbs that he would no longer need a wheelchair. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it could take more than a year for that to happen.
Thanks, but no thanks.
“I’m tired of being like this,” he said.
‘Everything within my grasp’
Hoping to speed his recovery along, Justin and his father will travel to Cologne, Germany next month to visit the Xcell Center, a private clinic group and institute for regenerative medicine that specializes in autologous adult stem cell treatments. There, Justin will undergo a multiple-step procedure in which doctors will remove bone marrow from his hip, process stem cells from that bone marrow, mix the stem cells with a small amount of his own spinal fluid and inject the solution back into his spinal fluid.
This all happens within a matter of days and the Pryors expect to return home within a week.
According to Xcell Center’s Web site, statistics from 110 spinal cord injury patients that received the same procedure show that nearly 60 percent “experienced improvements” after stem cell therapy. These improvements were reported by patients with both incomplete and complete injuries, the Web site states.
“Regaining sensation (feeling warm or cold sensations/ touch) was reported by 63 percent of patients,” according to the Web site .”More than 50 percent reported increased muscle strength and improved endurance.”
Justin said he first learned of this treatment about five months ago when his sister, Arlene Pryor, approached him with some information she had found online.
“She gave me a call one late night telling me she had done some research on the Xcell Center,” Justin said. “So I started looking into it myself and found that it is something that might just help me.”
He immediately dove into the subject of stem cell therapy — reading every article he could find, visiting every Web site he could find, talking with his doctors, family and friends. Before too long, he was completely sold on the idea. If a trip to Germany could get him back on his feet, a trip to Germany it is.
“With this procedure,” he said, “they’ve given me anywhere from 80 to 90 percent chance that I’d be able to walk again. After the accident, they only gave me a 2 percent chance, and I’ve gone from nothing to what I have now. I’ve beat the odds so far.
“I’m not going to say that for sure this is going to work,” he said, “but I think that it will. The way I look at it, I’ll do everything within my grasp and leave the rest of it up the good Lord above. How much will it work? No one knows for sure. It’s a gamble that you take.”
Chester said he was initially numb to the idea of stem cell therapy — “I didn’t know what to think,” he said. But after talking with his son and doing his own research, he’s confident that the procedure may be just what it takes to give Justin a normal life again.
“They’ve said that he could get a 60 percent improvement in what he’s got now,” Chester said. “If this kid can get 60 percent, he’ll throw that wheelchair away and he’ll walk.”
‘It just aggravates me’
Coiled up inside the excitement and sense of hope surrounding Justin’s upcoming procedure is genuine frustration and rage that it takes a trip across the Atlantic to get it done.
“Why should we have to go to another country to do this?” Chester said. “It just aggravates me that we can’t do this here.”
Stem cell therapy and the research that goes into it continues to be a hot-button topic here in the United States. Most of the debate revolves around embryonic stem cells, which to be used for medical purposes requires the destruction of human embryos. The support for embryonic stem cells lies in the fact that those cells can turn into any type of cell in the body, which may one day be able to provide tissues to replace worn-out organs or nonfunctioning cells to treat diabetes, heart attacks and other diseases. Early in his administration, President George W. Bush restricted federal funding for research on embryonic stem cells, a ban President Barack Obama quickly lifted days after his inauguration.
"At this moment, the full promise of stem cell research remains unknown, and it should not be overstated," Obama said at the time. "But scientists believe these tiny cells may have the potential to help us understand, and possibly cure, some of our most devastating diseases and conditions."
But allowing federal funding for embryonic stem cell research is just one step in the process. Stem cell therapy is still not allowed in the U.S., although the Food and Drug Administration approved in January the first clinical trial in which embryonic stem cells were to be used on paraplegics. Ultimately, though, many believe it could take 15 years or more before stem cell therapy is given the green light in this country.
“And you know why that is?” Justin said. “It’s because every time someone talks about stem cells, they talk about embryonic stem cells — killing babies. And right away, the conversation is dead. Embryonic stem cell therapy is not something I support, but those aren’t the only type of stem cells.”
Justin and his father both believe that the procedure Justin will receive next month, which uses solely adult stem cells taken from his own body, should be legalized in the U.S.
“The politicians in this country are putting us back in the stone age,” Chester said. “The stem cells Justin is going to receive in Germany are going to come from his own body. Now you tell me why the politicians here will not allow that in this country.
“And the politicians who oppose this need to walk in my shoes,” he said. “They need to help their 26-year-old son in and out of the house, do whatever he needs done, because he can’t walk. They need to walk a mile in my shoes, and then I think they would sit back, do more research and pay attention that stem cells are not just isolated to embryos.”
The Pryors aren’t alone in this belief. The physicians group American Stem Cell Therapy Association was formed in opposition of the FDA’s position that adult stem cells are a “drug,” and thus must be regulated as such. In March, the group released a statement which laid out its purpose and goals.
“The FDA’s position against someone using their own stem cells is taking it too far,” said Dr. Frank Falco, an ASCTA member. “We are talking about a person using their own tissue to treat a degenerative disorder or process safely without the use of medications or surgery. Although we agree that oversight and standards are necessary, this should be provided through a physician organization such as ASCTA rather than by a government agency.”
Benefit dinner
Between the procedure and travel expenses, the total cost for the trip to Germany is close to $16,000. To help raise money, a benefit dinner and auction will take place at 6 p.m. tonight at the Frontenac Senior Citizen Center, 113 N. Crawford St. Donations may also be sent to Justin Pryor, 769 E. 590th Ave. in Frontenac.
IF YOU GO
What: Benefit dinner and auction
Where: Frontenac Senior Citizen Center, 113 N. Crawford St.
When: 6 p.m.
Why: To raise money for Justin Pryor’s upcoming stem cell therapy treatment in Germany.
