Skin cells linked to spinal injury treatmentRSS Feed

Spinal injury patients have been offered a ray of hope for better treatment after a team from Oxford University found skin cells could be used to treat spinal cord damage.

The manipulated skin cells, a type of induced pluripotent stem cells, were found to generate brain cells and could be used to treat people who have suffered a spinal cord injury.

It is hoped that the skin cells could generate nerve cells to repair the spinal cord in the same way as they produce brain cells.

Shelia MacNeil, professor of tissue engineering at Sheffield University welcomed the study and pointed out that adult stem cells can be effective as the body is less likely to reject them than embryonic stem cells.

Matthew Dixon of serious accident litigation specialists Serious Law commented: "This is a big step forward in the treatment of a whole range of conditions, including serious neurological damage as the result of accidents."

The development comes off the back of spinal injury research in Japan that found the addition of valproic acid to neural stem cell treatment could aid recovery.

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Posted by John Sherrington 

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