Stem Cell Injections for Stroke Patients

Peer Responses
Peer 1 Chieyka
Damage to the brain and subsequent recovery is an interesting topic, and as you point out it is often affected most by age and functional recovery instead of structural recovery (Wilson, 2013). That is an important point because it shows that structural integrity is not everything—a lot of what matters is how functioning and how old the person is. Relearning skills lost can be easier for younger people and harder for older people. Structure, once damaged, is essentially not coming back. However, another good point that you make is that neurons and axons can grow back, which means the nerve fiber part of the nerve cell that takes part in the messaging does have to be considered. In people over the age of 25, regaining substantial functional recovery is going to be a significant trial (Arain et al., 2013). Good work, explaining what happens when the brain is damaged and why the functional recovery is the major obstacle that older people face. I would only add perhaps an example of a case study or two wherein it is shown how people respond to the various therapies that are available for functional recovery intervention.
Resources
Arain, M., Haque, M., Johal, L., Mathur, P., Nel, W., Rais, A., Sandhu, R., Sharma, S. (2013). Neuropsychiatric Disease & Treatment: Maturation of the adolescent brain. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles (Links to an external site.)
Wilson, J. F. (2013). Biological basis of behavior. https://content.ashford.edu
Peer 2 Amber
The important point you make in your assessment of brain damage is that the brain’s structure is impacted negatively but the brain can regrow neurons. Neuroplasticity is the process of regrowing and reconnecting neurons, and that is the most fascinating part of recovery (Yadate, Wari, Bedane & Gebayehu, 2019). You give a good example, too, of the stroke victim who needs to relearn basic skills like speech and movement. A damaged brain is unable to make the connections that once existed, so the brain has to work to reroute those connections in a different way. It is basically like learning to navigate another part of the neighborhood to get where you want to go because the normal route is under construction. Physical and occupational therapy are good examples of the kinds intervention available to people working on recovering their brain functioning. The use of embryonic stem cell injection to help stimulate growth in the brain is also an interesting discussion, as Wilson (2013) points out. Overall, this is a very good description of what is going on when recovery from brain damage is needed. Some additional points might be the effect that age has on the functionality of the brain during this recovery process.
References: 
Yadate, D., Wari, A., Bedane, K., &Gebayehu, G. (2019). A review article: Brain damage and neuroplastic responses. International Journal of Health & Allied Sciences, 8(4), 219–228. https://doi-org.proxy-library.ashford.edu/10.4103/ijhas.IJHAS_87_18 (Links to an external site.)
Wilson, J. F. (2013). Biological basis of behavior. https://content.ashford.edu