Background & Aims: Nowadays stem cell therapy is the common methods for treatment of spinal cord injury (SCI). Studies have shown that although transplantation of Neural Stem Cells (NSCs) in injured spinal cord promotes motor function but leads to development of neuropathic pain (NP). Since bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs) are commonly used in treatment of SCI, we sought to investigate whether intraspinaly injection of these cells develop NP.

Materials & Methods: Adult female wistar rats (n=24) were used. BMSCs were cultured and prelabeled with Brdu. Contusion model of SCI was performed at T8-9 level using New York University Device. The rats were divided into the three groups of 8 animals including: a control group, an experiment group and a sham group. In control group only a laminectomy was performed, the experiment group received (3×10⁵ BMSCs) intraspinaly seven days after injury. The sham group received serum in the same way. Locomotion was assessed using BBB test and NP was assessed by withdrawal threshold test weekly and for eight weeks.

Results: Significant improvement was observed in the BBB scores in experiment group (P<0.05) compared to sham group and there was a significant difference in withdrawal threshold means between sham and experiment groups (P< 0.05).

Conclusion: The present study has shown that intraspinaly transplantation of BMSCs can improve significantly locomotor recovery and also lead to developing of NP, so it is required for development of methods for attenuation of NP in cell therapy studies in future