Active clinical trials for "Spinal Cord Injuries"

The purpose of this study is to investigate the long term outcome of patients who receive hypothermia treatment for spinal cord injury. At this institution, intravascular hypothermia has been used for certain patients with spinal cord injury for the past two years. This study will collect data from vital signs and examinations while the patient is in the hospital and also when they follow up as an outpatient after they are discharged or go to a rehabilitation center. This data will then be analyzed and compared only to historically published data from previous studies. The aim of this investigation is to determine if intravascular hypothermia results in a beneficial outcome for patients with spinal cord injury.

Increased life expectancy in individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) present clinicians with the challenge of managing the secondary complications of SCI with the chronic diseases common in an aging population. Cardiovascular disease, cerebral vascular disease, and cognitive dysfunction are among the primary challenges facing clinicians in the treatment of an aging population. Cognitive dysfunction has been reported in upwards of 60% of the SCI population, which have been primarily attributed to concomitant traumatic brain injury or pre-morbid conditions. Identifying possible modifiable risk factors which contribute to the increased prevalence of cognitive dysfunction in the SCI population is of significant clinical relevance and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disorders have emerged as possible contributors to the cognitive disorders in the general population. These risk factors include: physical inactivity, chronically low or high blood pressure (BP), reduced blood flow to the brain, arterial stiffening, and impaired nervous system regulation of the cardiovascular system. These risk factors are particularly prominent in the SCI population as they represent a model of profound inactivity, have trouble regulating blood pressure, and suffer impaired cardiovascular regulation from their injury. In addition, we've recently reported deficits in blood flow to the brain at rest and during cognitive tests; with results being further impaired in SCI with chronically low blood pressure. Therefore the goals of this project are to determine the influence of cardiovascular and cerebral vascular responses at rest and during cognitive testing on test performance in 80 individuals with SCI compared to 50 age-matched non-SCI controls. All potential subjects will undergo a rigorous two-part screening process which consists of an initial screening via telephone and a detailed, in-person screening. Eligible subjects will be invited to participate in a 3 hour laboratory visit during which their arterial stiffness, blood pressure, heart rate, respiration rate and, blood flow to the brain will be monitored at rest and during a comprehensive series of cognitive tests. We hypothesize that blood pressure and cerebrovascular response to testing will account significantly for performance in cognitive testing that otherwise would have been attributable to SCI status.

The main goal of this research is to understand the neuronal mechanisms that mediate the development of spasticity and motor dysfunction after spinal cord injury. The investigators examine how neurons and neuronal circuits in an injured nervous system adapt to produce the uncontrolled and unwanted muscle contractions that affect the majority (80%) of patients with spinal cord injury. One of the neurons that the investigators study is the motoneuron that excites the muscles of the limbs to produce movement. Previously, the investigators have shown that after spinal cord injury, the excessive and uncontrolled activity of motoneurons during muscle spasms is mediated, in large part, by the activation of calcium currents in the human motoneuron. In human patients the investigators have used recordings from single muscle fibres to estimate the contribution of these calcium currents in activating the motoneuron during muscle spasms. In this proposal, the investigators study why motoneurons recover these calcium currents and self-sustained activity after chronic spinal cord injury. Because the calcium currents require the presence of the monoamine serotonin (5HT) to activate, and this monoamine is greatly reduced after injury, the investigators examine if the calcium currents recover because the 5HT receptors become spontaneously active without the need for 5HT to bind to the receptor, which the investigators hypothesize to be one of the causes of spasticity after spinal cord injury. This research will pave the way to develop new pharmacological and rehabilitative therapies to both control spasticity after spinal cord injury and augment residual motor movements.

Objective: To analyze the association between sexual function of men with spinal cord injury with possible predictive factors for dysfunction.

The purpose of this study is to record signatures from the fluid surrounding the spinal cord from people who have an implanted drug infusion system.

Although conventional risk factors for coronary heart disease (CHD) have been identified and routinely used to determine risk for CHD in the general population, a systematic approach to determine population-specific risk for CHD has not been performed prospectively in those with SCI. CHD is a leading cause of death in spinal cord injury, occurring at younger ages than in the able-bodied population. Conventional risk factors for CHD are high serum concentrations of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), low serum concentrations of high-density lipoprotein (HDL), diabetes mellitus (DM), positive smoking history, and positive family history of premature CHD. Coronary calcification (CAC) is a commonly occurring phenomenon that does not necessarily indicate significant obstructive disease. Studies have shown that a strong association exists between coronary calcification and coronary heart disease. The purpose of this study is to compare the CAC scores in persons with SCI with a historical control group of able-bodied persons from a national data base who will be matched for conventional risk factors for coronary artery disease (CAD) and to determine the relationship between CAC scores and conventional and emerging risk factors for CAD.

There has been little research on how chronic pain is related to brain activity. The purpose of this study is to learn more about pain and brain activity by finding any differences in brain activity among people who have moderate to severe chronic pain and a spinal cord injury, those who have a spinal cord injury but do not experience chronic pain, and people who have neither a spinal cord injury nor chronic pain (please note: subjects do not have to have pain to participate in this study). The information we collect will help the investigators get a better understanding of chronic pain.

This study will look at dietary patterns in individuals with chronic spinal cord injuries and the relationship between these dietary patterns and cardiovascular disease risk factors. The study is a supplement to the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults (CARDIA) study. The dietary history from CARDIA will be used. The investigators' primary hypothesis is the following: Greater whole-grain and dietary fiber intake will be favorably associated with adiposity (BMI and WC) and metabolic CVD risk factors (fasting glucose, fasting insulin, HOMA-IR, diabetes, hsCRP, TC, HDL-C, triglycerides, TC/HDL-C ratio, non-HDL-C, and systolic and diastolic blood-pressure) among a sample of individuals with SCI aged 38-50 who have been injured >1 year.

To establish a solid foundation, e.g. a network and a coordinating centre for testing new SCI therapies in forthcoming randomised controlled multi-centre clinical trials following international standards and guidelines.

Assess the relationship between body composition, metabolism, and dietary needs in people with spinal cord injury compared to their healthy controls that are age and sex matched.