Spinal cord injury is the most difficult traumatic neurological condition that is caused due to primary injury to the spinal cord. This results in structural damage, including haemorrhage, demyelination, edema, and brain trauma. Cell treatment for spinal cord injury provides neuroprotective effects and neuroregeneration potential.
Types and Symptoms Of Spinal Cord Injury
Symptoms in each individual with spinal cord injury vary according to the area and the severity of the injury. They are based on the type of injury, such as:
- Complete Injury: There is no movement or sensation below the site of injury
- Incomplete Injury: There is still some movement felt in areas below the point of injury
Symptoms of spinal cord injury also depend on the site that is injured. For instance:
- Injury to the neck (cervical): An individual with cervical injury experience sensory damage, loss of muscle strength in limbs and loss of sensation below the point of injury.
- Injury to the upper spinal cord (thoracic): This results in weak chest muscles and the individual may need a ventilator to breathe.
- Injury to the lower spinal cord (lumbar and sacral): An injury to this site can cause paralysis, loss of function in the lower limbs, loss of bladder and bowel control.
Stem Cells To Treat Spinal Cord Injury
An injured spinal cord is difficult to repair through traditional managements as they are ineffective. Cell treatment for spinal cord injury involves mesenchymal stem cells sourced from the bone marrow and has the potential to differentiate into various cells, and also adopt the properties of the host cells. When infused into the body, they exert a therapeutic effect by differentiating into neurons to replace the damaged cells. They also secrete neurotrophic factors and prevent the damaging inflammatory response. The main therapeutic effects of stem cells include the astrocytes contribution to the glial scar, provide support and insulation to axons (oligodendrocyte), and repairing or replacing the missing nerve cells in spinal cord injury. These multipotent stem cells also secrete pro-regenerative factors to heal and protect the damaged tissue cells.
Cell treatment for spinal cord injury is done at NeuroGen BSI hospital based in Mumbai. They have treated over 8000 people with stem cells for various neurological disorders for which stem cells are promising applicants. Some of the incurable neurological disorders treated at NeuroGen are:
- Autism
- Stroke
- Dementia
- Head injury
- Muscular dystrophy
- Spinal cord injury
- Motor neuron disease
The procedure of spinal cord injury cell treatment is safe and simple without having the patient to go under the knife. It just includes the extraction of the marrow from the patient’s hip bone, the separation of the stem cells from the marrow tissue and the final step is the infusion of the new stem cells in the spinal area.
When merged with the cerebrospinal fluid in the spinal area, the stem cells produce cytokines and growth factors that play an important role in promoting tissue regeneration. Based on the characteristics of stem cells, cell therapy is the most promising neuro-regenerative medicine for spinal cord injury.
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