Anti-CD11d monoclonal antibody treatment for rat spinal cord compression injury

This paper by Hurtado et al. examined responses of spinal cord-injured rats to treatment with a monoclonal antibody to the CD11d integrin, as a replication study of the paper by Gris et al. published in J. Neuroscience, 2004. The Hurtado et al. study addressed a portion of our investigation and obtained similar findings in the experiments that closely replicated ours in methodology and design, specifically the open field locomotor study. The high variability in their study of mechanical allodynia probably precluded detection of effects of the anti-CD11d treatment on this form of neuropathic pain. The lesion assessments were greatly different from those done in the Gris et al. study, and may not have been ideal for the extent of injury produced in this model, but did reveal a trend toward myelin preservation. The positive aspects of the study by Hurtado et al. encourage us to investigate this novel treatment further, in different animals and in different models of spinal cord injury.