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Cell Transplant Allows Paralyzed Man To Walk
New submitter tiberus sends word of a breakthrough medical treatment that has restored the ability to walk to a man who was paralyzed from the chest down after his spinal cord was severed in a knife attack. A research team from the UK, led by Professor Geoff Raisman, transplanted cells from the patient's nose, along with strips of nerve tissue from his ankle, to the place where the spine was severed. This allowed the fibers in the spinal cord to gradually reconnect.
The treatment used olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs) - specialist cells that form part of the sense of smell. ... In the first of two operations, surgeons removed one of the patient's olfactory bulbs and grew the cells in culture. Two weeks later they transplanted the OECs into the spinal cord, which had been cut through in the knife attack apart from a thin strip of scar tissue on the right. They had just a drop of material to work with - about 500,000 cells. About 100 micro-injections of OECs were made above and below the injury. Four thin strips of nerve tissue were taken from the patient's ankle and placed across an 8mm (0.3in) gap on the left side of the cord. ... Two years after the treatment, he can now walk outside the rehabilitation center using a frame.
This is truly great!
If only our daily "news" was filled with more with these types of stories than the typical FUD and propaganda perpetuated by these organizations.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
...for all the breakthrough treatments that use embryonic stem cells.
I can walk! But now the only thing I can smell is back sweat.
I read some time ago that the olfactory cells are one of the few nerve cells that maintains the ability to reproduce and create new connections, then it seems that the researchers basically created a "hard hack" with that. Interesting, and hopefully it will be applicable in many similar cases.
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
I heard he's gay. Why not give this treatment to someone that is more deserving?
Nice to see breakthrough research like this coming from a single-payer healthcare system like the UK. When people start saying that the only places that can afford groundbreaking medical research are the ones where the "customers" pay a fortune, it'll be good to be able to point them to things like this.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Operation was performed in Poland by team led by Dr Tabakow. Professor Raisman developed his method enough to perform test on rats.From TFA: "In 2005, Prof Raisman was approached by a Polish neurosurgeon who had begun researching how to apply the technique in humans. Dr Tabakow carried out an initial trial involving three paralysed patients who each had a small amount of OECs injected in their damaged spinal cords."
Correlation does not imply causation.
(ducks)
I've heard a rumour that he can also smell things behind him too!
(yes I just started that rumour)
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
This is great. Now if we could only get a cell transplant that would allow idiots to think.
Proverbs 21:19
in another country other than the USA.
While the USA spirals down into a society controlled by religious nuts, other countries are doing the research.
And when they make the breakthrough, that lying politician and media pundit who ranted about abortion and whatnot will RUN and spend their millions to take advantage of that breakthrough - while the gullible people who follow and listen to them live in their ignorant satisfaction that they saved "babies" from being "murdered".
Anti-abortion laws are for little people. That politician who got elected on the "Pro-Life" platform will be the first to send his granddaughter "over there" to get the "problem" solved.
And TRY to PROVE it!
In the meantime, he and his colleagues write bills and pass laws to make themselves richer - while distracting the ignorant masses with distraction issues like abortion, gay marriage, gun control, and rationalizing tax cuts for the super wealthy as "helping the job creators".
God! I mean you got your Ar-15 but what good is it when a silent drone takes you out from a mile away?
OUtlaw abortion? I take my daughter on a plane and get one. Some prosecutor tries to get me....his career is over because I'm rich.
Gay marriage? Yeah, there are plenty of things that married couple benefit from. And everyone - without exception - who objects is a bigot. There is no moral (unless you follow that fairytale - Bible) reason to object.
Can someone clarify the discrepency here?
Dr Tabakow carried out an initial trial involving three paralysed patients who each had a small amount of OECs injected in their damaged spinal cords. While none showed any significant improvement, the main purpose of the study was achieved, showing that the treatment was safe.
Prof Wagih El Masri said: "Although the clinical neurological recovery is to date modest, this intervention has resulted in findings of compelling scientific significance."
Darek Fidyka, who was paralysed from the chest down in a knife attack in 2010, can now walk using a frame.
So the doctors think that going from paralyzed to walking is modest and insignificant? Were they not talking about the same patient? Something doesn't make sense here.
How does he smell?
Terrible.
(Forgive me. The first image that came to mind when I read this story was the movie "Sleeper", when they were trying to clone the assassinated leader using his nose.)
Or they could use a 1988 device to just regenerate the nerves:
Method and apparatus for regenerating nerves
http://www.google.com/patents/US4919140
Just the stories should be more accurate.
The research was mostly in UK but surgery was in Poland:
"Our team in Poland would be prepared to consider patients from anywhere in the world who are suitable for this therapy. They are likely to have had a knife wound injury where the spinal cord has been cleanly severed"
Prof Geoff Raisman said: "It would be my proudest boast if I could say that no patient had had to pay one penny for any of the information we have found."
NSIF said if there were any patents arising, it would acquire them so as to make the technique freely available.
Every time I hear of some new spinal cord therapy to resolve paralysis, I can't help to think of Christopher Reeve, and whether, if he were alive today, he would be cured.
The man was from Poland, the operation was in Poland and was conducted by polish team in hospital in Poland.
He has also recovered some bladder and bowel sensation and sexual function.
I'm happy to not be paralyzed and certainly hope to stay that way. But, if I was... I think these functions might be even more important to me then getting my legs back. Don't get me wrong, not being able to stand or walk would really suck. But.. a person with no leg function might get along in a wheel chair. Shitting oneself and not being able to enjoy sex... there just isn't a chair for that.
Such a success is nothing to sneeze at.
every time he smells food his legs start shaking.
Mostly random stuff.
Some men brought to him a paralyzed man, lying on a mat. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the man, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.”
At this, some of the teachers of the law said to themselves, “This fellow is blaspheming!”
Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said, “Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts? Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’? But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the paralyzed man, “Get up, take your mat and go home.” Then the man got up and went home. When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe; and they praised God, who had given such authority to man.
--Matthew 9:2-8
I would totally have told this guy his sins were forgiven.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
You guys are slipping and got scooped this morning. I usually hear about these things on the local news-traffic-n-weather radio station 2-3 days after I read about it on Slashdot. This story must've languished in the queue for a long time.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
A research team from the UK, led by Professor Geoff Raisman, transplanted cells from the patient's nose
RTFA.
UK team researched it TOGETHER with Polish team. TFA mentiones both teams, and two leading doctors, one in UK, one in Poland.
Polish team performed the actual transplantation (practical part). It was led by a Polish doctor.
It's $%&^ Enigma all over again, "solved" by British who conveniently forgot it was Polish team who solved it first.
There has been a lot of dubious research in this area. Studies where only a small minority of the subjects of the experimental procedure had their results published, and a lot of work with patients where the spinal cord was not actually completely severed. At least some of the results are likely to come simply from insufficient retraining prior to the experimental procedures.
Hopefully this one is actually true. We could really do with some good news in this area.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
I think these functions might be even more important to me then getting my legs back.
#wordcrimes
His spine was severed in a knife attack two years ago.
But through radical new technology, he walks again.
And now he's out for revenge!
Starring Bruce, or Arnold, or Claude, or Steven, or Mickey. . . .
(also need a catchy movie title for this - any suggestions?)
Am I the only one that read the title as "Cell [Phone] Transplant Allows Paralyzed Man To Walk"?
It was the Polish secret service who first captured an early Enigma machine, and let the codebreakers see what they were up against. The only reason anyone would deny that is simple ignorance.
It was British mathematicians who designed, programmed and operated the Colossus computer that actually broke the codes, day after day.
Like just about any worthwhile endeavour, it was a team effort. Yes, you have every right to feel aggrieved at the headline giving all the glory in this case to "a research team from the UK", but don't let that spill out into unrelated historical strawmen.
And if God were so great and awesome then he wouldn't have cut the man's spinal cord in the first place, now would he?
FLAME ON BITCHES! Remember, YOU had to bring religion into this.
Shitting oneself and not being able to enjoy sex... there just isn't a chair for that.
Instant reaction was to google for such a chair... but I think a search with "chair", "shitting oneself" "sex" might not be in my best interest
A woman has developed a nose-like growth eight years after a stem cell treatment to cure her paralysis failed. At the Hospital de Egas Moniz in Lisbon, Portugal, the unnamed woman, a U.S. citizen, had tissue from her nose implanted in her spine. Doctors hoped the cells would develop into neural cells and help repair the nerve damage to the woman's spine. But the treatment failed. However, last year, eight years after the stem cell operation, the woman, then 28, complained of increasing pain in the area. Doctors discovered a three-centimetre-long growth, which was found to be mainly nasal tissue, as well as bits of bone and nerve branches that had not connected with the spinal nerves.
Yep, glad I'm not the only one that was thinking that...
You always hear about Turing (cause he was gay and by default the most super fragilisitic incredible genius evvver!!) and Bletchley Park but who ever mentions the fact that the intital break throughs were by Polish mathmaticians...
That's because they solved it in Reverse! In...Reverse...
Try the veal, its lovely. I'll be here all week.
And George W. Bush and the Republicans, pandering to their funnymentalist base, close to stopped all stem cell research...
And killed Superman.
Hmmm, Dick cheney *does* seem to channel Lex Luthor....
mark