Word: cords
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...enjoyed an electoral advantage on "values," the Democrats showcased it with a prime-time convention speech by the well-known medical expert Ron Reagan. Message? On the one side are the forces of the good, on the verge of curing such terrible afflictions as Parkinson's, diabetes and spinal-cord injury. On the other are the forces of reaction and superstition who, slaves to a primitive religiosity, would condemn millions to suffer and die. Or as Reagan subtly put it, the choice is "between reason and ignorance, between true compassion and mere ideology...
...furniture in the crowded hallways and push patients around on jerry-rigged gurneys made with bicycle wheels. Yet Nan Davis has traveled halfway around the globe to undergo a new procedure available only here. Six hours ago, Dr. Huang Hongyun injected 1.5 million fetal cells into her damaged spinal cord. Davis, a teacher from Ohio, hasn't walked since 1978 after a car crash left her paralyzed from the bottom of her rib cage down. Shortly after she awakens, Davis signals with a thumb and index finger that she can feel nearly two inches lower than before. "My goal...
...Huang's novel procedure involves injecting cells from a fetal olfactory bulb, the part of the brain where nose cells terminate, into the damaged area of the spinal cord. Huang says the transplanted olfactory cells help repair damaged nerve cells in the spine. Although he hasn't yet published his findings, the results so far seem compelling. "I'm pretty convinced of definite sensory improvement and modest motor improvement" in Huang's patients, says Dr. Wise Young, a prominent expert in spinal injuries and chairman of cell biology and neuroscience at Rutgers University (where Huang studied under Young...
...differentiate between various smells. They transport these signals with the help of olfactory ensheathing glia (OEG) cells. Because axons extend from all nerve cells, scientists have long wondered what would happen if OEG cells were taken from the olfactory bulb and introduced somewhere else?say, in the spinal cord of someone like Nan Davis...
...That's just what Huang does, injecting fetal OEG cells into the damaged spinal cord. What's odd is that they appear to have such a rapid effect. Axons regenerate only as fast as a hair grows, so it should take months for an axon to extend from the point of injury to a paralyzed area. Yet Huang's patients seem to improve within hours of surgery. "Something is happening that we can't understand, but can't ignore," Huang says...