Questionnaire Survey on Regenerative Medicine for Individuals with Spinal Cord Injury / The Japanese Journal of Rehabilitation Medicine

ABSTRACT

Objectives：This study investigated the perceptions of regenerative medicine among individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI).Methods：Between October 2019 and February 2020, we interviewed individuals with SCI who had a history of inpatient or outpatient visits to our hospital using a structured questionnaire on regenerative medicine.Results：Ninety-nine participants completed the questionnaires. The mean age was 52.8±14.8 years, with 9.1％ of them being females. The majority of cases included cervical SCI (54.5％), AIS A lesion (63.6％), and traumatic causes (90.9％), and 93.9％ of the individuals had some interest in regenerative medicine for SCI, which is well known to individuals with SCI in the following order：induced pluripotent stem cells (n＝89), bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (n＝25), and autologous olfactory mucosal transplantation (n＝16). Individuals with SCI chose motor function (65.7％), bladder and bowel function (24.3％), and sensory function (9.0％）when asked to choose only one symptom that required improvement. Individuals with cervical SCI had more interest in regenerative medicine than those with SCI (46.3％ vs. 26.7％). In contrast, the majority of respondents with SCI were concerned about the effectiveness (n＝59) and cost (n＝53) of the treatment. Most participants obtained information about regenerative medicine on television (n＝73), followed by the Internet and/or social networking services (n＝54).Conclusion：Approximately half of individuals with SCI hope that regenerative medicine will restore their ability to walk.