Objective: There is no known effective treatment for chronic stroke. In this report, we used positron emission tomography (PET) with [18F]fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) to map the metabolic brain response to neuronal cell implantation in the first human neuroimplantation trial for stroke.
Methods: Twelve patients (nine men, three women; mean age +/- standard deviation, 60.8+/-8.3 yr) with chronic basal ganglia infarction and persistent motor deficit underwent FDG PET within 1 week before and 6 and 12 months after stereotactic implantation of human neuronal cells. Serial neurological evaluations during a 52-week postoperative period included the National Institutes of Health stroke scale and the European stroke scale.
Results: Alterations in glucose metabolic activity in the stroke and surrounding tissue at 6 and 12 months after implantation correlated positively with motor performance measures.
Conclusion: FDG PET performed as part of an initial open-label human trial of implanted LBS-Neurons (Layton BioScience, Sunnyvale, CA) for chronic stroke demonstrates a relationship between relative regional metabolic changes and clinical performance measures. These preliminary findings suggest improved local cellular function or engraftment of implanted cells in some patients.