Cell transplants help reverse paralysis
Patients are feeling a sensation of hope
Robert Smith, 46, of Harrison Township underwent a Chinese procedure to help him regain movement.
The first American spinal cord patient to undergo a fetal cell transplant procedure — a Harrison Township man paralyzed in a Lake St. Clair diving accident — is regaining some movement and sensation a month after the experimental operation in China.
Paralysed girl’s ‘miracle’ steps
A teenager who was paralysed from the neck down in a car accident has taken her first steps – despite being told she would never walk again.
Gemma Quinn, 19, from Woolton, Merseyside, suffered severe spinal injuries in a car accident 11 years ago.
She was told she would always be reliant on a Ventilator and a wheelchair.
Gemma said it felt “amazing” to be able to walk again.
How Nerve Cells Grow
FRIDAY, July 25 (HealthDayNews) — Researchers at Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions have identified a protein that promotes the growth of tentacle-like axons on nerve cells.
The finding could eventually help scientists develop ways to rebuild nerves lost to spinal cord injuries or degenerative conditions such as Huntington’s disease. Researchers have spent decades trying to find signals that guide axons and lets these cell tips reach out to distant targets.
Reeve recovery hopes boosted
Scientists have uncovered evidence that actor Christopher Reeve could make a full recovery from paralysis if his spinal injury can be fixed.
Reeve, the star of the Superman films, was paralysed from the neck down after damaging his spinal cord in a riding fall seven years ago.
But doctors at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, US, have discovered that his brain has maintained a near-normal ability to detect feeling and movement.
Spinal Cord: Heal Thyself
Transplanted stem cells can improve Motor skills in injured rats
FRIDAY, Aug. 30 (HealthDayNews) — Japanese researchers are reporting yet another advance in the repair of damaged body parts using fetal stem cells.
This one could be big because it involves spinal cords, experts say.
Benefit for paralyzed snowboarder takes off
BRECKENRIDGE – On April 6, 2002, Matt Wyffels was competing at Copper Mountain and broke his back.
After suffering a spinal cord injury, doctors told Wyffels he’d never be able to use his legs again.
Wyffels resisted.
Christopher Reeve for Embryonic Stem Cells
July 28, 2001: Christopher Reeve, Mary Tyler Moore, and others favoring research involving embryonic stem cells, continue to pressure President Bush, who is said to be agonizing over the stem-cell decision, one of the most important of his presidency.
On CNN’s Late Edition, Reeve argued against focusing only on adult stem cells, saying this would be a “big mistake because you could spend the next five years on adult stem cells and find out they are not capable of doing what we already know embryonic stem cells are capable of doing now.”
Police Officer Hospitalized After Crash
Spinal Injury Could Cause Paralysis
(LOUISVILLE, June 29th, 2001, 3:30 p.m.) — A Louisville police officer was seriously injured this morning in a single car wreck in the city’s south end.
Officer Kelly Fentress reportedly was traveling northbound on Southern Parkway and possibly swerved to avoid another vehicle when his car left the road and smashed into a tree at Southern Parkway near Kingston Drive. The tree was knocked completely out of the ground by the impact, and crews had to cut Fentress from the wreckage.
Pig Snouts Used to Treat Spinal Cord Injury
In a recent study, scientists used cells from pig snouts to successfully repair severed spinal cords in rats. The pig cells were engineered so that they would not be rejected by the rat’s immune system, as is usually the case with cross-species transplants. In the future, doctors may be able to use these engineered cells to treat human spinal cord injuries, according to an article published in the Aug. 29 issue of Nature Biotechnology.