Nerve grafting

A 36-year-old woman developed supraclavicular skin necrosis, followed by sloughing of subcutaneous tissue down to the first rib, including the dorsal roots of the brachial plexus, after receiving an interscalene block followed by an infusion 5 months later she still had complete sensory and motor paralysis of the C5 nerve root requiring nerve grafting. 

Berry, M., Hall, S., Follows, R., Rees, L., Gregson, N., and Sievers, J., Response of axons and glia at the site of anastomosis between the optic nerve and cellular or acellular sciatic nerve grafts, J. Neurocytol., 17, 727, 1988. 

Villegas-Perez. M.P., Vidal-Sanz, M., Bray, G.M. and Aguayo, A.J. (1988) Influences of peripheral nerve grafts on the survival and regrowth of axotomised retinal ganglion cells in adult rats. J. Neurosci. 8 265-280. 

The importanee of sialidase(s) in axon outgrowth has been shown in an in vivo animal model. It is well known that, because of the presence of axon regeneration inhibitors (ARIs) that aceumulate at the sites of injury in the central nervous system, axon outgrowth is in part inhibited, thus severely limiting the recovery from traumatic injury. Conversely, peripheral nerve sheaths support axon outgrowth,thus peripheral nerve graft implantation into the eentral nervous system offers a potential... 

J. A. Bertelli and M. F. Ghizoni, Brachial plexus avulsion injury repairs with nerve transfers and nerve grafts directly implanted into the spinal cord yield partial recovery of shoulder and elbow movements, Neurosurgery, 52 (2003) 1385-1389, diseussion 1389-1390. 

Archibald, S.J., Krarup, C., Shefner, J., Li, S.T., and Madison, R. 1991. Collagen-based nerve conduits are as effective as nerve grafts to repair transected peripheral nerves in rodents and non-human primates. /. Comp. Neurol. 306 685-696. 

Conductive polymers (CPs) are an emerging teehnology in the field of biomaterials. While CPs retain a predominantly investigative role in the field of medical implants, they have shown potential across a wide range of applications, including neural interfaces, biosensors, nerve grafts, and drug-delivery devices. 

Nerve grafts or conduits guide the repair of injured neural tissue. Neural repair in the central nervous system, as in the case of spinal injury, as well as peripheral nerve damage associated with trauma, often result in uncontrolled growth of neural tissue. The result is that no effective conduction path is obtained and both movement and sensory response can be lost in the body portion distal to the injury. 

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