Effect of auto-transplantation of bone marrow on the nerve autography in the dogs

Abstract

The research was conducted to study the repair of transected sciatic nerve through by grafting sciatic nerve with nerve segment and addition of bone marrow in dogs. Twelve adult dogs from both sexes was used. They was divided into two groups, six animals in each group. The left sciatic nerve was used as a model in this research for monitoring the process of nerve repair. In group one, the sciatic nerve was transected and a piece of nerve about 1cm in length was removed, and the resultant gap was repaired by autotransplantation with a segment of nerve harvested from the median nerve of the forelimb with the consideration that the harvested median nerve segment was slightly longer than the resected sciatic nerve segment. The implanted nerve segment was sutured with sciatic nerve using non absorbable suture (nylon 5). In group two, the same surgical procedure was performed as in group one, but a bone marrow that aspirated from the same animal was applied on the nerve transplantation. The assessment of sciatic nerve repair was accomplished by studying the clinical observation of normal physiological function of the operated limb, additionally studying the histological changes on the nerve graft transplantation at 30 and 45 postoperative days. The study was revealed, the application of bone marrow on the nerve graft segment was enhanced the degree of healing of transected sciatic nerve that indicated by improvement the functional use of affect hind limb clinically, with improvement the vasculrization of nerve graft segment and increase proliferation of nerve cells (Schwann and microglial cells) with extension of collagen fibers that aid to bridge the sciatic nerve with grafted nerve segment histologicaly rather than in group one.In conclusion the addition of bone marrow on the nerve graft segment accelerate the degree of healing of transected sciatic nerve with improve the functional use of operated limb.