Stem Cell Treatment For Spine Injury

While the concept seems appealing i am concerned that patients may be drawn in by hope and hype without having the full picture of the science.

Stem cell treatment for spine injury.

The therapy developed in the regenerative neurobiology laboratory under the direction of anthony j. Clinical trials of stem cell treatment for spinal cord injury int j mol sci. Food and drug administration has even expressed. What is a degenerative disc and the degenerative cascade.

So these treatments are not available in the mainstream medical market. Injury and the consequence of injury disrupts the turning over of cells basically because of reduced electrical activity which oligodendrocytes depend on for survival and myelination. Authors kazuyoshi yamazaki 1 masahito kawabori 1 toshitaka seki 1 kiyohiro houkin 1 affiliation 1 department of neurosurgery. In fact as of january of 2020 the fda hasn t approved any stem cell therapies for this purpose.

Study participants must be age 18 or older and have experienced traumatic spinal cord injury within the past year. A mayo clinic neurologic surgeon and the lead author cautions that each patient is different so it s too early to consider stem cell therapies as a treatment or cure for. Could stem cell therapy be an answer for disc disease. Shim explains how a disc goes through the degenerative cascade.

Stem cells have long held hope for many people with spinal cord injuries. Windebank is also involved in the new clinical trial for people with traumatic spinal cord injuries. I m convinced that endogenous stem cells in the spinal cord those naturally born there by the million every hour even in spinal cord injured adults. Patients randomized to the medical management arm will eventually cross over to the stem cell arm.

Windebank m d is moving into phase 2 clinical trials. Since their discovery in 1998 they have been used in thousands of studies to one day cure paralysis but there is still no cure for those with chronic injuries despite this scientists have come a long way especially in recent years. The reason for this ambiguity is that stem cell therapy for spinal cord injuries is in its infancy as a treatment. In celltop phase 2 40 patients will be randomized to receive stem cell treatment or best medical management.