Neural stem cells developed by Newark’s StemCells Inc. were transplanted Wednesday into a spinal cord injury patient, the first person treated in a Phase I/II trial.
The procedure, led by Dr. Raphael Guzman, a neurosurgeon and Stanford University faculty member, was performed at Balgrist University Hospital at the University of Zurich in Switzerland.
StemCells’ (NASDAQ: STEM) trial focuses on patients with chronic spinal cord injuries. That differs from a trial by Menlo Park’s Geron Corp. (NASDAQ: GERN), which earlier this week treated its fourth patient — the first in California — with a spinal cord injury that was no more than 14 days old.
What’s more, StemCells uses neural stem cells that it developed, while Geron’s trial uses cells from human embryonic stem cells.
“With this first patient enrolled and dosed, we remain on track to meet our goal of treating the first cohort of patients by the end of the year,” Dr. Stephen Huhn, head of the central nervous system program at StemCells, said in a press release.