Pilot study: bone marrow stem cells as a treatment for dogs with chronic spinal cord injury
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RESEARCH
Open Access
Pilot study: bone marrow stem cells as a treatment for dogs with chronic spinal cord injury Carlos Alberto Palmeira Sarmento1, Marcio Nogueira Rodrigues1,2*, Renato Zonzini Bocabello1, Andrea Maria Mess1 and Maria Angelica Miglino1
Abstract Background: Chronic Spinal Cord injury is a common, severe, and medically untreatable disease. Since the functional outcomes of acute and experimental chronic spinal cord injury have been shown to improve with stem cell therapy, a case study was conducted to test if the application of stem cell also regenerates chronic SCI dysfunction. Transplantation of foetal bone marrow stem cells was applied in seven dogs with chronic spinal cord injury. Magnetic resonance images and assessments of symptoms according to the Olby scale were used to diagnose the severity of injury. Result: All dogs improved locomotor and sensory function when examined 90 days after surgery, and showed increased movement of the hind limbs, and were able to stand upright, as well as to take small steps. Tail tone was observed in seven dogs, pain reflexes and defecation return were observed in five dogs. Conclusion: The transplantation of bone marrow stem may be a promising, reliable and safe treatment for chronic spinal cord injury. Keywords: Cell therapy, Dysfunction, Spinal cord, Disease
Background Spinal Cord injury (SCI) is a disease with devastating effect on dogs, including paresis or paralysis and/or urinary and faecal incontinence. Chronic SCI is regarded as a medically untreatable condition and there is no effective treatment [1-3]. Spinal cord lesions are commonly reported in veterinary medicine, especially in dogs, where they usually occur in association with traumas that are induced by prolapsed intervertebral discs or exogenous sources such as motor vehicle accidents [4,5,1]. In humans, between 3 and 5 people per every 100,000 are affected with SCI [6]. Clinical signs in dogs are similar to those encountered in human patients, and dogs that suffer from severe SCI have the same poor prognosis for neurological recovery as their human counterparts [7]. The severity of the neurological signs are graded as follows: grade I (only spinal hyperaesthesia), grade II (ambulatory paraperesis, ataxia, proprioceptive * Correspondence: [email protected] 1 School of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Sciences, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil 2 Av. Prof. Orlando Marques de Paiva, 87, Cidade Universitaria-Butanta, São Paulo 05508270, Brazil
deficits), grade III (non-ambulatory paraparesis), grade IV (paraplegia with nociception), and grade V (paraplegia with loss of nociception) [8]. Likewise, a scale of 14 points is used to assess the severity of the disease [9]. Diagnostic imaging has become increasingly important for assessing the prognosis and determining treatment decisions with intervertebral disc extrusion [8,10-12]. For dogs, the temporal aspects of the onset and duration of clinical signs after intervertebral disc herniation have been used as prognostic indicators [1]
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