Autologous Stem Cell Therapy for Cerebral Palsy

Abstract

Introduction: We describe treatment of Cerebral Palsy with adult stem cells derived from bone marrow and fat of the same patient. Adult stem cells are of two types, the mesenchymal and haemopoietic stem cells which have potential to duplicate, indefinitely produce 50 types of growth factors that repair and regenerate tissues in an epigenetic manner. Every organ has its own stem cells, for example kidney stem cells, liver stem cells, etc. When specialized cells in an organ get damaged, the local stem cells come forward and get differentiated into specialized cells and the tissue damage is replenished. But when the stock of this reserve of local stem cell is over, the organ starts failing. In autologous stem cell therapy, we harvest stem cells from other healthy organs like fat and bone marrow which have abundant stem cells and put them into the diseased organ. Adult stem cells differentiate into neurons in vitro when added with nerve growth factor which is present in every nerve tissue. Our stem cell research was done by following all the guidelines set at national and international level. In India the incidence of cerebral palsy is around 5/1000 live births. In cerebral Palsy the upper motor neuron is weak, hence the lower motor neuron becomes hyper active leading to spasticity. The treatment involves mainly physiotherapy and prognosis is poor. Physiotherapy is a palliation and does not repair damage in the brain. The conventional therapy has failed to give any satisfactory results in these children hence something new needs to be done. Materials and Methods: In last 2 years we did stem cell therapy for 21 cases of CP in our center with age of 9 months to 17 years. Out of 21 cases of CP, 7 (33.3%) cases had quadriplegia, 6 (28.57%) paraplegia and 1 (4.76%) monoplegia, 2 (9%) hypotonic, 5 (23.8%) hemiplegia, 4 (19.04%) with mental retardation and 3 (14.28) had features of ADHD and Autism. 18 patients had squint in the eyes, 8 patients had food regurgitation and drooling of saliva, 2 patients had audiovisual impairment, 3 patients had bronchial asthma and one patient had menstrual irregularity. 26 cases were put as control with age range of 9 months to 19 years. 9 (34.61%) patients had quadriplegia, 8 (30.76%) paraplegia and 3 (11.53) had monoplegia, 3 (11.53%) hypotonic, 5 (19.23) with mental retardation and 6 (23.07) had features of ADHD and autism. 21 patients had squint in the eyes, 11 patients had food regurgitation and drooling of saliva, 4 patients had audiovisual impairment, 5 patients had bronchial asthma in the control group. 11 patients were subjected to adipose tissue derived stem cell therapy and 10 with bone marrow derived stem cell therapy. All patients were examined at 3 monthly intervals. Maximum follow up was 2.5 years and minimum of one year. Results: The results of bone marrow derived stem cells and adipose tissue derived stem cells were almost the same. Results took 3 months to appear and positive outcome came till one year since therapy. The spasticity was significantly reduced in 15 out of 18 patients in 6 months. Out of 18 patients who had squint, it was regressed completely in 12 (66.66%) patients and partially in 3 (16.66%) in 6 months’ time. 8 patients had faulty deglutition and 75% of them had 90% reg