I Want to See: The Use of Stem Cell Therapy in Tinnitus

razo

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Jan 25, 2018
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As Prof. Rauschecker pointed out, tinnitus is characterized by overactivity in certain parts of the brain, in the same way as epilepsy during a seizure. It should be possible to target the areas in the brain specific to tinnitus in the same way as they are targeting the areas in the brain specific for epilepsy. From the article:

Transplantation of interneurons
  • The brain has neurons that can excite other cells and others that inhibit or stop action of cells. Normally, there is enough balance between these cells to help us function normally (i.e., think, remember, etc). During a seizure, the balance between exciting and inhibiting cells is off. Ways to decrease excitation or increase inhibition may be useful in epilepsy. Many current seizure medications focus on changing ways cells inhibit brain function.
  • A similar approach has been tested with stem cells. Specific groups of inhibitory neurons (also called interneurons) are formed from a specific area of the brain (called the medial ganglionic eminences). When scientists took these neurons and transplanted them into the brains of animals that had been treated to have seizures, they found that these cells were able to work and increase inhibition. This reduced seizures.

    https://www.epilepsy.com/article/2016/6/use-stem-cell-therapy-epilepsy
 

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