BACKGROUND No cure is available for human spinal cord injury. Cell elimination by localized radiation therapy that is timed within 2-3 weeks postinjury can facilitate repair of structure and function in transected rat spinal cord. In pilot studies in contusion spinal cord injury, a model similar to crush/fracture injury in human, we did not observe the expected beneficial effects of radiation t...

A 43 year old woman presented with a history of a hyperextension cervical injury resulting in transient quadriplegia. Cervical spine radiography revealed developmental spinal stenosis and magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated underlying spinal cord oedema secondary to contusion, with a herniated disc at C3-C4. The Torg ratio may be used to aid the initial diagnosis of cervical spine stenosis....

The lack of effective therapies for spinal cord injury points to the need for identifying novel targets for therapeutic intervention. Here we report that a small molecule, LM11A-31, developed to block proNGF-p75 interaction and p75-mediated cell death crosses the blood-brain barrier efficiently when delivered orally. Administered starting 4 h postinjury, LM11A-31 promotes functional recovery wi...

The aim of this study was to characterize magnetic resonance diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) in proximal regions of the spinal cord following a thoracic spinal cord injury (SCI). Sprague-Dawley rats (n=40) were administered a control, mild, moderate, or severe contusion injury at the T8 vertebral level. Six direction diffusion weighted images (DWIs) were collected ex vivo along the length of the...

introduction spinal cord injury without radiological abnormality (sciwora) is a rare entity and usually involves the cervical spine. thoracic spine involvement is very rare due to the stability provided by the rib cage. the mechanisms of injury and pathophysiology are still debatable. case presentation we present a case of an adult male who had road traffic accident and presented with paraplegi...

Bone marrow stromal cells (BMSC) transplanted into the contused spinal cord may support repair by improving tissue sparing. We injected allogeneic BMSC into the moderately contused adult rat thoracic spinal cord at 15 min (acute) and at 3, 7, and 21 days (delayed) post-injury and quantified tissue sparing and BMSC survival up to 4 weeks post-transplantation. BMSC survival within the contusion a...

Studies on the experimental spinal contusion injury in animals confirm that posttraumatic ischemia contributes to central cystic necrosis or fibrosis occurring at the level of the spinal cord lesion. Hyperbaric oxygen (HBO) modifies the degree and extent of the pathology in the spinal cord of the experimental animals. HBO has been used for 45 patients with recent spinal cord injuries. The exten...

introduction: spinal cord injury (sci) is one of the most serious clinical diseases, which not only affects the patient's physical and mental status, but its effects will be spread to family and community. after severe spinal cord injury, astrocytes of the central nervous system (cns) become reactive astrocytes, and play the main role of glial scar formation. the scar is a major obstacle t...

introduction: spinal cord injuries (sci) lead to permanent irreversible functional deficits.  poor prognosis of patients is the motivation of searching a treatment for the chronic injury.  planting stem cells provides us with a promising strategy. in the meanwhile, the use of olfactory ensheathing cells (oecs) has shown very good results.  this study aims at evaluating the effect of transplante...

We provide the first data that cathepsin B (Cath B), a lysosomal cysteine protease, is up-regulated following contusion-spinal cord injury (SCI). Following T12 laminectomy and moderate contusion, Cath B mRNA and protein expression profiles were examined from 2 to 168 h post-injury in rats using real-time PCR and immunoblots, respectively. Contusion injury significantly increased [mRNA]Cath B in...