The pathological processes developing after spinal cord injuries often lead to formation of cysts. Existing surgical and medical methods are insufficient for treatment of post-traumatic spinal cord cysts. One of the emerging tools is cell therapy. Olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs) are perspective cells for cell therapy. In this study, we demonstrated that human OEC transplantation is effective in experimental spinal cysts. For our experiments, we selected animals only at the intermediate stage of recovery with scores from 8 to 13 according to the Basso, Beattie, and Bresnahan (BBB) scale. Cells were transplanted in different quantities (0.75 and 1.5 million) into the fully formed cysts and in the areas of injury without cysts. Improvement of limb mobility after human OEC transplantation into post-traumatic cysts was shown. In the group of rats with cysts, time-dependent increase in the BBB score was observed in subgroups treated with 0.75 and 1.5 million OECs with no statistically significant time-dependent dynamics of BBB values in the control group. When all three subgroups (control and two OEC doses) were compared, the Kruskal-Wallis test showed the presence of differences between subgroups after 1, 3, and 4 weeks of treatment with evidence of divergence increase. There was no statistically significant difference between the two doses of OEC treatment. The human OECs in the experiments without cysts were not effective. It was also shown that PKH26-labeled human OECs survive throughout the experiment and migrate to nearby areas of the cyst. Therefore, it was found that it is effective to transplant human OECs into fully formed cysts. In the future, autologous OECs can be used to personalize the treatment of patients with spinal cysts.
Keywords: cell therapy; human olfactory ensheathing cells; injury of spinal cord; olfactory mucosa; spinal cysts.