Gov't approves test using iPS cells to treat spinal cord injuries

My question as a non-scientist is if millions of nerve fibers are severed and you put in a lot of such cells, how do you ensure that the proper end points reconnect?

In general the treatment depends on the plasticity of the nerve fibers to reconnect and form new circuits, the brain will have to learn again to interpret and use the signals that it can receive and send with those circuits as it did with the original ones.

The case of the "head transplant" was not considered realistic by mainstream science and the surgery never happened as predicted by experts.

They have to monitor the test patients closely - if the iPS cells don't take, there's a chance they become cancerous (iPS cells are fast-dividing cells)

@reckless. This is a very small group study with all concerned giving permission. If it’s fails, we can learn, if it is a success, 10s, 100s, 1000s, 100000s may Benefit. Just worried about drug company profit intervention...

It's great to see progress and I hope they will succeed. However, there is not much published data to indicate their method would work. See this blog for details: https://ipscell.com/2019/01/japans-dangerous-gamble-approving-unproven-stem-cells-for-spinal-cord-injury/

I hope no one gets hurt. It's a good institution so I want to believe they know what they are doing.

Great to see them moving forward. I wish all involved success and good luck to the first patients. There are also risks involved as well related to cells turning cancerous. The first patients could possibly benefit greatly from this but are also taking a risk as well. Hope their courage pays off!

Nice to see good news for a change. A doctor in my hospital suggests the next 10 years will be very good.

Still at an experiment stage?

In Japan, any adipose or mesenchymal cell therapy is well over a million yen and not covered by health insurance.Allogenic therapies don’t exist!

There is still years to go before these treatments arrive and are used in hospitals here.....

Excellent news. Good luck to all involved.