Two research studies still in their infancy could offer hope to people who have suffered spinal cord damage after being severely injured in car accidents, slip and fall accidents, truck accidents or by other means. The therapies - currently being offered to only a few of the estimated 250,000 Americans living with a serious spinal cord injury - are designed to be minimally evasive but powerful, giving hope to victims who medical science has traditionally been unable to help.
What Are These Spinal Injury Therapies?
One of the therapies -the more controversial of the two - involves injection of embryonic stem cells into the spinal cord to promote muscular and nerve cell regeneration. Based on animal tests performed in recent years, researchers are optimistic about the likelihood of success for the 10 patients who will be treated at five separate study sites around the country.
The other revolutionary therapy is designed to treat not only the underlying spinal cord injury, but also the neuropathic (nerve-related) pain associated with it. That research study is currently being carried out by scientists from the Keck Center at Rutgers University who have managed to artificially synthesize a protein - RhoA - that is vital for nerve cell regeneration. Similarly to the stem cell research, scientists have had promising results trying the RhoA therapy on the spinal cords of laboratory animals and are hopeful that the process will be equally successful on humans.
Regardless of how your spinal cord injury (or that of a loved one) occurred, if it was at the hands of another person's negligence - like an unsafe workplace, a reckless truck driver, an inadequately maintained sidewalk or in another type of negligence-related accident - these therapies might one day help you. In the meantime, though, you should contact an experienced personal injury attorney in your area to learn more about your legal rights and options you may have to recover compensation for your pain and suffering.
![[picture of] Daniel A. Kalish](/design/images/attorneyPic.jpg)
