title: Kinematic analysis of motor recovery with human adult bone marrow-derived somatic cell therapy in a rat model of stroke.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The extent to which pharmaceutical and behavioral therapies following central nervous system injury may either deter or encourage the development of compensatory movement patterns is a topic of considerable interest in neurorehabilitation. However, functional outcome measures alone are relatively insensitive to compensatory changes in movement patterns per se.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This study used both functional outcome measures and kinematic analysis of forelimb movements to examine the effects of human adult bone marrow-derived somatic cells (hABM-SCs) on motor recovery in a rat model of stroke.
  
  
  METHODS
  Adult male Long-Evans black-hooded rats (n = 12) were trained in a forelimb reaching task and then underwent surgical middle cerebral artery occlusion, producing a stroke that impaired the trained paw. One week poststroke, animals were randomly assigned to either a hABM-SC injection or control injection group. Reaching behaviors were then compared at baseline and at 10 weeks poststroke.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Both groups improved their outcome scores during the 10-week recovery period. However, the hABM-SC group recovered significantly more function than controls in terms of the number of pellets retrieved. Furthermore, the control group appeared to improve their functional performance by using compensatory strategies that involved an increased number of trajectory adjustments, whereas the hABM-SC group's kinematics more closely resembled prestroke movement patterns.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study demonstrates that kinematic measures established in stroke research on humans are also sensitive to performance differences prestroke versus poststroke in the rat model, reinforcing the utility of this method to evaluate treatments that may ultimately translate to patient populations.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Internal Medicine, Loyola University Medical Center, Maywood, IL, USA. robynne.braun@gmail.com
authors.forename: Robynne G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Braun
authors.forename: Ellen M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Andrews
authors.forename: Gwendolyn L
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Kartje
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena / Q000502:physiology*; D001854:Bone Marrow Cells / Q000502:physiology; D016026:Bone Marrow Transplantation / Q000379:methods* / Q000534:rehabilitation; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005552:Forelimb / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D051381:Rats; D020318:Rats, Long-Evans; D020521:Stroke / Q000628:therapy*