Cell transplant helps paralyzed man walk with frame

They used a nerve bridge constructed between the two stumps of the damage spinal column.

A Bulgarian man who was paralyzed from the chest down in a knife attack can now walk with the aid of a frame after receiving pioneering transplant treatment using cells from his nose.

The technique, described as a breakthrough by a study in the journal Cell Transplantation, involved transplanting what are known as olfactory ensheathing cells into the patients spinal cord and constructing a nerve bridge between two stumps of the damaged spinal column.

We believe this procedure is the breakthrough which, as it is further developed, will result in a historic change in the currently hopeless outlook for people disabled by spinal cord injury, said Geoffrey Raisman, a professor at University College Londons (UCL) institute of neurology, who led the research.

The 38-year-old patient, Darek Fidyka, was paralyzed after suffering stab wounds to his back in 2010. Following 19 months of treatment, he has recovered some voluntary movement and some sensation in his legs, his medics said.

The Nicholls Spinal Injury Foundation, a British-based charity which part-funded the research, said in statement that Fidyka was continuing to improve more than predicted, and was now able to drive and live more independently.

Raisman, a UCL spinal injury specialist, worked with surgeons at Wroclaw University Hospital in Poland to remove one of Fidykas olfactory bulbs, which give people their sense of smell, and transplant his olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs) and olfactory nerve fibroblasts (ONFs) into the damaged area.

They used a nerve bridge constructed between the two stumps of the damage spinal column, they said in the study.

OECs are a type of cell found in both the peripheral and central nervous system. Together with ONFs, they make bundles of nerve fibers that run from the nasal mucosa to the olfactory bulb, where the sense of smell is located.

When the nerve fibers that carry smell become damaged, they are replaced by new nerve fibers which re-enter the olfactory bulbs, the researchers explained in their study.

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Cell transplant helps paralyzed man walk with frame