ChinaSCINet Update

[Wise Young]

I hope this is wrong.
Why would they spend a lot of time, money and resources on a phase three trail if the 6month data of the phase two trail shows no recovery?

Solan, I did not present the 6 month data. As I have said many times before, we don't have that data from Kunming yet and will not until the end of November. These are still the 6 week data. Wise.

[Wise Young]

They recovered some walking without increase in motor function or sensory?

Also, regrowing spinal cord tissue might not help functional recovery?

Maybe I misunderstood what he said.

Buck503,

Yes, as I pointed out, some subjects (and I emphasize that this is still very early in the study) appear to be getting some locomotor function back without any change in sensory or motor scores. This may be because some of the regrowing axons may be activating walking behavior through the central pattern generator and they have not yet recovered direct voluntary activation of the spinal cords.

The MR/DTI images are from subjects in Hong Kong who did not receive intensive locomotor training. Just because there is growth of white matter across in the injury site does not mean that the fibers have reconnected with neurons in the spinal cord that innervate the legs. This may take time. It also suggests that locomotor training is important for recovery of locomotor function.

Wise.

[allenstevens]

keep up the hard work wise I just like to see posts on this thread to know that someone cares and is trying to help.

[Wise Young]

what is strange not the name of dr zhu hui on the website of the hospital and nothing on the internet and read in on a site that Chinese hui zhu retired definitive

fti,

Dr. Zhu has retired from the Army and has started a new center at a new hospital in Kunming. People who want to contact her can write to zhuhuichina5@gmail.com.

Wise.

[Wise Young]

Paolo, I thought that too, was the jist of it that the rehab regimen improved walking function and ucbmc doesn't really do anything? As to sensory and bbb???

Lunasicc,

I would not conclude that the UCBMC "doesn't really do anything" based on the data to date. In Hong Kong, we saw no white matter crossing the injury site in any subject before treatment. In one subject who did not have treatment, we saw no white matter growth across the injury site over a 2 year period. In 3 of 5 subjects who were treated with UCBMC and had reasonable MRI-DTI images, we saw white matter tracts crossing the injury site. In Kunming, some subjects that have been treated with UCBMC show early locomotor improvement though they did not show changes in motor scores in the legs at 6 weeks. We did not do MRI/DTI in the Kunming subjects but all received the intensive locomotor training.

Long tract regrowth is a very slow and the axons have a long ways to grow. Axons grow very slowly, no faster than hair growth and that is assuming that they know exactly where to go and have no impediments. A mm per day would be very fast. In order to activate muscles directly, the axons must grow all the way to the lumbosacral spinal cord located at T12 and L1 spine, a distance of over 500 mm from the neck to the bottom of the rib cage.

So, let me give an analogy. We are waiting in Miami Florida for a train to come from Boston. The train tracks have been disrupted in Connecticut (cervical spinal cord injury). No trains have come from Boston for a long time. We hear on the news that an effort has been made to repair the train tracks. After waiting a day, no train appears. The news, however, tells us that some trains have been sighted in Washington DC and we are seeing increased activity in Atlanta and Alabama. Should we be concluding that the repairs of the train track have been unsuccessful?

Wise.

[ay2012]

Sorry Dr. Young but just to clarify: the observation that some patient are walking is from seeing patients six months into the trial whereas the lack of improvement in motor and sensory scores is for six week data. Yet you seem to indicate that people are walking without improvement in these scores...

[Solan]

Solan, I did not present the 6 month data. As I have said many times before, we don't have that data from Kunming yet and will not until the end of November. These are still the 6 week data. Wise.

Understood! I couldn't log in and watch the webcast and only read what was said in the post on here.
Thank you for the feedback.

[lunasicc42]

keep up the hard work wise I just like to see posts on this thread to know that someone cares and is trying to help.

Just to be clear, I didn't mean to seem ungrateful at all. That quote is how I feel... Just had a question

[paolocipolla]

Understood! I couldn't log in and watch the webcast and only read what was said in the post on here.
Thank you for the feedback.

You can watch all the videos here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/spinal-cord-workshop

All preseantations worth watching IMO.

Paolo

[paolocipolla]

I have corrected the link, all the videos are here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/spinal-cord-workshop

Paolo

[Fly_Pelican_Fly]

I have corrected the link, all the videos are here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/spinal-cord-workshop

Paolo

Thanks Paolo. Keith Tansey and Hans Keirstead's presentations were very very informative. Good stuff.

[Imight]

Perhaps another 6 months for them to connect to the neurons?

[tweez]

having watched the video of dr. Young, I have to admit the preliminary results he presents are pretty encouraging, above expectations (which in all honistly are pretty low in terms of treating human SCI after decades of false promises and failures).

I am generally skeptic, and these results once again show the difficulty of the task ahead of us (even with some fibers regrowing past injury site, no significant functionnal recovery).

I think realistically, one would have to wait 24-36 months post-transplant of cells combined with uninterrupted physical rehab to be able to conculde if it does have an effect or not on recovery.

If only there were more such extensive and credible clinical trials made as the one of dr. Young I would be much more optimistic about a viable treatment being available to us.

If there was a way to also combine Ch'ase to the stem cells injection, I believe we would be getting really close to a "cure"

I really hope it doesn't take another 10 or 20 years to get these kind of trials going (like it appears now, as Acorda are really not in a rush)

[JohnMarz]

Was there any relation between the amount of cells injected and growth of white matter? Also did the length of time since the injury seem to effect the growth?

[Tachtig]

I will just wait for the official report to arrive later this year since I don't know what to make of all this speculation and what if's. Can we expect a real conclusion in the upcoming report? Or will the conclusion still be "wait and see, it takes time so it could still go either way"