Nicholls Spinal Injury Foundation

Who we are

We believe that SCI can become a treatable condition and the research we fund is making incredible breakthroughs.

Nicholls Spinal Injury Foundation, known as nsif, was founded by chef David Nicholls after his 18-year-old son Daniel became paralysed from the neck down. During his gap year, Daniel was swimming between the safety flags on Bondi Beach when he dived into a wave, hit a hidden sandbank that lay beneath and broke his neck.

Traumatised by the sight of his young son unable to move, as well as the other young people with paralysis in the hospital, David told Dan he would do everything possible to get him walking again. He made this promise to Dan without realising that paralysis was “incurable”.

So nsif was born with a very specific purpose: to fund research and development into a biological cure for paralysis.

That was the first step in an incredible journey that we hope will radically improve the lives of people with SCI in the future.