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Tissue engineering and the intervertebral disc: the challenges

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Abstract

Disc degeneration is a common disorder. Although the back pain that can develop in association with this is rarely life-threatening, the annual cost in terms of morbidity, lost productivity, medical expenses and workers’ compensation benefits is significant. Surgical intervention as practised currently is directed towards removing the damaged or altered tissue. Development of new treatment modalities is critical as there is a growing consensus that the strategies used currently for symptomatic degenerative disc disease may not be effective. Accordingly, there is a need to develop an entirely new way to treat this disorder; regenerative medicine and tissue engineering approaches appear particularly promising in this regard. This paper reviews some of the challenges that currently are limiting the clinical application of this approach to the treatment of disc degeneration.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by EU “MyJoint” (FP6: 28861(NEST)) (SR and JU) and CIHR and NIHR21 (RK). We thank Godfrey Chang for his help in preparing Fig. 1 and Andy Biggs for Fig. 2.

Conflict of interest statement

None of the authors has any potential conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CIHR-Bioengineering of Skeletal Tissues Team, Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, ON, M5G 1X5, Canada

    Rita Kandel

  2. Centre for Spinal Studies and ISTM, Keele University, Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry, Shropshire, SY10 7AG, UK

    Sally Roberts

  3. Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, Le Gros Clark Building, Oxford University, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QX, UK

    Jill P. G. Urban

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  1. Rita Kandel
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  2. Sally Roberts
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  3. Jill P. G. Urban
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Correspondence to Rita Kandel.

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Kandel, R., Roberts, S. & Urban, J.P.G. Tissue engineering and the intervertebral disc: the challenges. Eur Spine J 17 (Suppl 4), 480–491 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00586-008-0746-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00586-008-0746-2

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