Thanks Geoff!
This is different than the ADCT procedure that one of our members had. The procedure done in Denver was injection of stem cells at the time of discectomy. I've seen several presentations on this and it looks promising. The ADCT procedure involves harvesting your own disc nucleus cells at time of discectomy and culturing them to grow your own replacement nucleus. The cells are reinjected many weeks later after the disc has healed.
One obvious difference between the procedures that the stem cell injection occurs at a time when the annular defect is raging... and possibly made worse by discectomy. I wonder if adding volume to the nucleus with the defect still open substantially increases the risk of recurrent herniation? With the ADCT procedure, they actually pressure test the disc before injection of the cultured cells.)
Mark
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