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ASAP Research Grant Recipient: Mary Eaton, PhD, Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at the University of Miami School of Medicine

Project Title: Pre-Clinical Development of GABA Cell Therapy for Chronic Pain after Spinal Cord Injury

Dates: October 1, 2003 September 30, 2004

Grant Amount: $75,000

The second year of funding built upon the encouraging results Dr. Eaton obtained during her first year of study, which examined the use of cell transplant therapy for the treatment of chronic pain. As with spinal cord injury, approximately 70% of syringomyelia patients suffer chronic pain. Dr. Eaton is using rats with induced syringomyelia to study the effects of injecting human neuronal GABA cells near, but not into, the spinal cord, as a natural, long-term method of delivering pain relief. Dr. Eaton had encouraging results in 2002, showing that the transplanted GABA cells reduced chronic pain behaviors in rats. Dr. Eaton believes this method will transfer well to humans and anticipates eventually going to human trials. Her work continues to build upon these results.