14 DAY TRIAL // Experiments carried out on laboratory rats have recently shown that human neural stem cells injections can successfully be used to treat spinal injuries in these rodents.
Writing in the journal Stem Cell Research and Therapy, the international team of researchers who carried out this series on experiments detail how the laboratory animals injected with stem cells experienced an improvement in both their motor and their sensory functions.
EurekAlert reports that, as part of this research, a total of 42 female rats suffering with spinal compression injuries were split into three groups.
The ones in the first groups were administered spinal injections with stem cells, while the ones belonging to the second group were given placebo.
The female rats in the third group were not given any treatment.
Apart from keeping a close eye on how the motor and sensory functions of these rats evolved over time, the scientists monitored how well the injected stem cells grafted into the animals' spines.
When comparing the mobility of the three categories of rats, the researchers noticed that the ones injected with stem cells did in fact experience an improvement in their ability to get about and process sensory cues.
“The primary benefits were improvement in the positioning and control of paws during walking tests and suppression of muscle spasticity,” Martin Marsala, MD summed up the findings of these experiments.
“Importantly, cysts or cavities that can form in or around spinal injuries were not present in any cell-treated animal. The injury-caused cavity was completely filled by grafted cells,” Martin Marsale went on to say.
The researchers are confident that, given the success rates reported during these experiments on rats, stem cells injections might one day constitute a treatment option for human patients who have suffered various spinal cord injuries.
“Our findings demonstrate that human foetal spinal cord-derived neural stem cells, with an already established favorable clinical safety profile, represent a potential cell candidate for cell replacement therapy in patients with traumatic spinal injuries,” the researchers write in their paper.