Rewiring stroke recovery: pairing deep brain stimulation with rehabilitation to help patients move an arm, a hand, a life - again.
Enspire DBS Therapy, Inc. - the wordmark of a Cleveland Clinic portfolio company betting a decade of neuroscience on a single idea: stimulate the brain while it relearns to move.
Every year, stroke leaves millions of people with a weakened arm or hand that never fully recovers. Physical therapy helps, but for many survivors the gains plateau and the limb stays stubborn. Enspire DBS Therapy, a clinical-stage medical device company in Cleveland, Ohio, is testing a different premise: that recovery can be pushed further if the brain is electrically encouraged while the patient does the hard work of rehabilitation.
The company's therapy combines deep brain stimulation - the same broad approach used for years to treat Parkinson's disease - with structured physical therapy. Rather than targeting the motor cortex, Enspire stimulates the dentate nucleus, a structure deep in the cerebellum that helps fine-tune voluntary movement. The idea is to "re-establish neurological input" during rehab, opening a window in which the brain is more receptive to relearning motor tasks.
Enspire was spun out of Cleveland Clinic Innovations in 2010 and remains a Cleveland Clinic portfolio company. It commercializes technology built on more than a decade of preclinical research led by Cleveland Clinic scientists Andre Machado and Kenneth Baker. In 2017, a Cleveland Clinic team performed what was reported as the nation's first deep brain stimulation procedure for stroke recovery. The work has been slow, deliberate, and unusually evidence-driven for a young device company.
Enspire's therapy is not a replacement for rehabilitation - it is meant to make rehabilitation work harder. Here is the basic sequence.
A commercially available DBS system places an electrode into the cerebellar dentate nucleus.
Targeted stimulation re-establishes neurological input, priming motor pathways.
Patients do structured physical therapy, weekly, while stimulation is active.
The goal: measurable gains in arm and hand motor function that stick.
Figures below are drawn from Enspire's public statements and preclinical reporting. The EDEN feasibility trial is small (12 patients) - encouraging, not conclusive. The pivotal RESTORE trial exists precisely to test these signals rigorously.
Note: bars are scaled for visual comparison. "~3x" reflects reported near-tripling of baseline scores among patients with at least minimal preserved distal motor function at enrollment.
"This financing represents an important milestone for Enspire as we advance RESTORE through pivotal clinical development."- Scott Kokones, CEO and Co-Founder
People living with chronic upper-extremity impairment - a weakened arm or hand that has not recovered through conventional rehab. Stroke is a leading cause of long-term adult disability, and this group has few options once standard therapy plateaus.
Neurosurgeons, neurologists, physiatrists and stroke rehabilitation programs at academic and trial centers deliver the therapy. Enspire's RESTORE trial is currently enrolling participants at no cost to them.
The problem Enspire is trying to solve is narrow and stubborn: rehabilitation after stroke has a low ceiling. By re-establishing neurological input while the patient trains, the company is betting it can raise that ceiling - turning a plateau into progress for people who have run out of other options.
Stroke recovery is a crowded field of ideas and a thin field of proven treatments. Enspire's approach is distinct in one important way: it goes deep.
Most emerging stroke-recovery neuromodulation is peripheral (vagus nerve stimulation) or non-invasive (TMS, tDCS). Enspire is one of the few applying implantable deep brain stimulation, and it targets the cerebellar dentate nucleus rather than the cortex - a bet grounded in over a decade of Cleveland Clinic neuroscience.
Competing paths include MicroTransponder's Vivistim (vagus nerve stimulation for stroke rehab), non-invasive brain stimulation, and intensive robotic rehabilitation. Enspire's wager is that a proven, deep-brain platform can deliver gains those approaches can't reach.
Rather than engineer bespoke hardware, Enspire uses a commercially available DBS system - the same class of device with a long safety record in Parkinson's disease. The innovation lives in the target and the therapy, not the silicon.
Clinical-stage and venture-funded, Enspire develops and validates its therapy through trials toward FDA marketing authorization and eventual commercialization to hospitals and stroke-rehab centers. As a Cleveland Clinic portfolio company, it licenses technology from the institution's research arm.
An implantable neuromodulation therapy stimulating the dentate nucleus to enhance recovery of upper-extremity motor function after stroke, delivered alongside structured physical therapy.
The first-in-human study - Electrical stimulation of the DEntate Nucleus - showing safety and feasibility. Results were published in Nature Medicine; 9 of 12 participants improved.
A multicenter pivotal study of DBS plus rehab for chronic upper-extremity stroke impairment, featuring a five-month blinded comparison phase. Interim results are anticipated mid-2027.
RESTORE is designed to generate the safety and effectiveness data needed to support a future application for FDA marketing authorization and commercialization.
Roughly $27.9M raised to date - patient capital for a long-horizon device company, drawn largely from within the Cleveland ecosystem.
Cleveland Clinic Innovations established Enspire DBS Therapy to commercialize DBS-for-stroke research.
Cleveland Clinic awarded nearly $5M to study deep brain stimulation for stroke recovery.
Cleveland Clinic performed the first-in-human deep brain stimulation for stroke recovery.
First-in-human feasibility results showed promise, and the company closed a Series B led by Cleveland Clinic.
Enspire began its multicenter pivotal study of DBS plus rehabilitation.
Genesys Capital led new financing to continue RESTORE enrollment; interim results expected mid-2027.
Leads Enspire's strategy and clinical development. Has steered the company through its Series B and B1 financings and the transition from feasibility to pivotal trials.
Cleveland Clinic principal investigator whose research underpins the therapy. Co-led more than a decade of preclinical work on DBS for stroke; holds equity in Enspire.
Cleveland Clinic scientist Kenneth Baker, PhD, co-led the foundational research alongside Machado. Enspire operates as a small, mission-driven team - roughly eleven people - inside the Cleveland Clinic innovation ecosystem, blending neuroscience rigor with medtech commercialization.
It develops an implantable deep brain stimulation (DBS) therapy that, combined with physical rehabilitation, aims to restore arm and hand movement in people with chronic impairment after a stroke.
Not yet. Enspire is a clinical-stage company; the therapy is investigational and being evaluated in the RESTORE pivotal trial to support a future application for FDA marketing authorization.
RESTORE is Enspire's multicenter pivotal study evaluating the safety and effectiveness of DBS plus structured rehabilitation for chronic upper-extremity stroke impairment, with a five-month blinded phase and interim results anticipated mid-2027.
Enspire was spun out of Cleveland Clinic Innovations in 2010 and remains a Cleveland Clinic portfolio company, commercializing technology developed by Cleveland Clinic researchers Andre Machado and Kenneth Baker.
Approximately $27.9M in total, including a $17.6M Series B in 2023 and a $10.3M Series B1 in January 2026, with backing from Cleveland Clinic, JobsOhio and Genesys Capital.
Watch: search YouTube for "Cleveland Clinic deep brain stimulation stroke recovery" for interviews and a demonstration of the DBS + rehab approach. Direct video links were not published on the company site at time of writing.
Profile compiled from public sources including enspiredbs.com, Cleveland Clinic Newsroom, PR Newswire, BioSpace and Nature Medicine coverage. Clinical figures are as reported publicly; the therapy is investigational and not FDA-cleared. Details noted as approximate where sources vary.