Boston (SmartAboutHealth) - A new study funded by the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation has revealed that many more Americans than previously thought have paralysis.

Researchers  led by Anthony Cahill from the University of Mexico worked to conduct a telephone survey with 33,000 Americans.

What they found was pretty startling, as they discovered that more Americans have some form of paralysis than they could have ever imagined.

Researchers discovered that there are 5.5 million people in the U.S. who have some form of paralysis.

This could be anything from having a minor form of paralysis, to being fully paralyzed.

Overall, this works out to 2% of the entire U.S. population suffering from some form of the disease.

Upon further research, they discovered that the two most common causes of paralysis included stroke at 29%, and spinal cord injuries at 23%.