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Hope stems for man with lung disease
Two years after Uadayan Patel, 66, decided to become a ‘guinea pig’ for an experiment to use fat-derived stem cell therapy to find a cure for his chronic lung disease, he has no regrets. For Patel, the relatively unknown therapy offered a slim hope for his degenerative disease — idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) — which causes the lungs to become scarred and stiffened leading to progressive difficulty in breathing.
It was in March 2009 that Patel, a psychoanalyst, started suffering from frequent bouts of dry cough. Soon, he was unable to walk even ten steps without gasping for breath. “I was unable to talk for more than two minutes. All my physical activities were restricted,”
Despite medication, Patel’s health suddenly deteriorated in November 2009 and he was put on oxygen therapy to boost the supply of oxygen to his blood stream.
“There is no known treatment to reverse the progression of IPF and life expectancy from the time of diagnosis is only three to five years,” said pulmonologist, Dr Pratibha Singhal, who is treating Patel.
With the option of a lung transplant ruled out, as it would require an extended stay abroad, Patel was desperate for options.
When a friend told him about the Cooperage-based Kasiak Research, which was doing research on the efficacy of stem cells derived from body fat to cure chronic illnesses such as diabetic foot ulcers and liver disease, he decided to take a chance.
“I didn’t want to die. I told them that I was willing to risk the new therapy and signed the consent form.”
Last May, fat (adipose) was extracted from Patel’s body from which the stem cells were isolated and injected back into his body, said Vijay Sharma, a scientist at Kasiak. Since the stem cells are derived from the patient’s body, the risk of an allergic reaction was negligent.
Now, Patel’s lung function tests, oxygen saturation on exercise and psychical activities have shown significant improvement, said Dr Singhal.
“My capacity to walk and talk has improved significantly. I no more feel the unnerving breathlessness and tiredness. I do weights at the gym, can drive my car and eat out at restaurants,” said Patel.
Posted:
3/13/2011 9:34:52 AM by
Don Margolis | with
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A Tauranga company is offering veterinary clinics a process for stem-cell treatment that improves healing and brightens – even lengthens – the lives of dogs, cats and horses.
The groundbreaking treatment is being applied to osteoarthritis, and ligament and tendon injuries affecting racehorses.
Stemvet New Zealand, established in September 2009, is committed to providing veterinarians with the knowledge and products to make stem-cell therapy an everyday treatment.
It also wants to put New Zealand veterinarians at the forefront of developments in regenerative medicine.
“The treatment certainly relieves pain and slows the ageing process,” said Stemvet co-owner Gil Sinclair.
“The degree of improvement varies with each patient. But in most cases there’s dramatic improvement in the animal’s mobility and wellbeing.”
Dr Sinclair, a veterinarian who has four in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) laboratories in New Zealand and Australia, has been involved with animal reproduction for nearly 30 years. He has recently worked with researchers in Sydney on the development of stem-cell extraction technology and its application in veterinary clinics.
His enthusiastic business partner, Kerry Hitchcock, talks about a dog suffering from osteoarthritis that was “a doormat at home”.
The dog had an intravenous dose of stem cells and its condition improved. In a short time it was bouncing around.
Mr Hitchcock said an inquisitive neighbour asked the dog’s owner what had happened to the dog. “The neighbour was amazed in the change to the dog,” said Mr Hitchcock.
Early cases treated so far have been dogs – between 8 and 14 years – severely affected with osteoarthritis, and young racehorses that have suffered tendon injuries or have osteoarthritis.
Fat tissue containing dormant adult stem cells is taken from the rump of horses and from under the skin of dogs, and from other animals behind their ribs.
Each gram of fat can contain anything from 4.5 million to 28 million stem cells. The fat is digested in a water bath at 37C, then spun in a centrifuge, and the stem cells filtered out.
A platelet concentrate – containing natural stem-cell activators – is extracted from a blood sample. The platelet and other solutions are mixed with the “fat-extracted” stem-cell concentrate to activate the stem cells.
The mixture is then exposed to a photobiostimulator which provides extra activation. The whole process takes three and a half hours.
The now active adult stem cells are reintroduced to the same animal, mostly by direct injection into the affected joints or tissues. Some are administered intravenously and find their way through the blood system to the inflamed area.
“We are talking about adult stem cells that can be guided into promoting health,” said Dr Sinclair. “There is a huge concentration of them in the body but they are non-functional. By taking fat out of the animals and extracting the stem cells and activating them we can improve the healing process.”
Stemvet has become the exclusive New Zealand distributor for Australian-based MediVet stem-cell therapy products and equipment, which includes the water bath, centrifuge, photobiostimulator and extraction kit.
The package, including equipment and kit, costs $15,000 and in the past month six veterinary clinics, in Christchurch, Blenheim, Wellington, Tauranga, Hamilton and Auckland, have signed up. Stemvet provides training, free of charge. Pet owners are charged about $2500 for the treatment – cheaper than the $4000 quoted by an overseas competitor.
Posted:
2/28/2011 9:40:49 AM by
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New Hope for Baby Boomers with Leukemia and Lymphomia
Loyola University Health System
2/17/2011
Newswise — MAYWOOD, Ill. — As the first baby boomers turn 65, Loyola University Hospital has begun offering stem cell transplants to leukemia and lymphoma patients who previously were too old to qualify.
Hospitals traditionally have not offered stem cell transplants to patients older than 60 due to potentially severe complications. But Loyola now offers this treatment to patients in their 60s and early 70s.
“A lot of seniors are taking very good care of themselves. They’re in excellent shape, even running marathons and half-marathons,” said Dr. Patrick Stiff, director of Loyola’s Cardinal Bernardin Cancer Center. “As they potentially could live another 15 or 20 years, we believe they are just as worthy of receiving transplants as people in their teens or 20s.”
The median age of patients who are diagnosed with leukemia is between 65 and 68. For patients older than 60 who have aggressive forms of leukemia and undergo conventional therapy, the five-year survival rate is less than 5 percent.
But six of the first seven plus-60 patients who have undergone umbilical cord blood stem cell transplants at Loyola have survived. “They’re doing much better than we anticipated,” Stiff said.
William Karris of Carol Stream, Il. was 65 when he received a cord blood transplant at Loyola for an aggressive form of chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Without the transplant, Karris was expected to live only about six months. The transplant was successful, and Karris now is in remission more than a year and a half after transplant. The chances of a relapse are less than 2 percent, Stiff said.
Karris now plans to go ahead with a delayed knee-replacement surgery, and then return to work as a Bellwood police officer. “I feel pretty good,” he said.
A stem cell transplant can be a grueling and risky procedure. The patient undergoes high-dose chemotherapy, and sometimes high-dose radiation, to kill cancer cells. The treatment also destroys the patient’s immune system cells. To compensate, the patient receives an infusion of donor stem cells, which develop into healthy immune cells.
In addition to the side effects of chemotherapy and radiation, a patient is at risk for severe infections until the new immune system takes hold. And once established, the new immune system can attack the patient’s own body, a condition called graft-vs.-host disease. In such cases, the patient receives drugs to suppress the immune system, which in turn can increase the risk of infections.
Donor cells can come from a donor’s bone marrow or from a newborn’s umbilical cord blood. Stiff said cord blood transplants are easier on elderly patients than bone marrow transplants. Less than 10 percent of cord blood transplant patients experience significant graft-vs.-host disease, compared with about 50 percent of patients who receive bone marrow transplants.
Loyola has treated more than 3,000 patients with stem cell transplants, more than any other center in Illinois, and has one of the largest unrelated donor transplant programs in the world. Loyola physicians are currently focusing on umbilical cord blood transplants and have a number of novel therapies available for patients with leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma who otherwise can not find a donor elsewhere.
Loyola has performed more than 90 cord blood transplants, and a new study has shown that a center’s experience is indeed an important factor in patient outcomes. Researchers examined records of 514 cord blood transplant patients in North America and Europe. They found that, 100 days after the transplant, the mortality rate was more than twice as high at centers with limited experience (fewer than 10 transplants). The study is published in the January, 2011 issue of the journal Bone Marrow Transplantation.
Posted:
2/25/2011 9:47:30 AM by
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Umbilical cord stem cells accelerate diabetic wound healing
Korean scientists have found that transplanting human umbilical cord blood-derived endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) ‘significantly accelerate’ wound closure in diabetic mouse models.
Diabetes is often associated with impaired wound healing, according to study’s corresponding author, Wonhee Suh of the CHA University Stem Cell Institute.
“EPCs are involved in revascularization of injured tissue and tissue repair,” said Suh.
“Wounds associated with diabetes that resist healing are also associated with decreased peripheral blood flow and often resist current therapies.
“Normal wounds, without underlying pathological defects heal readily, but the healing deficiency of diabetic wounds can be attributed to a number of factors, including decreased production of growth factors and reduced revascularization,” he said.
For the study, the researchers transplanted EPCs into an experimental group of mice modeled with diabetes-associated wounds, but did not transplant EPCs into a control group.
They found that the EPCs “prompted wound healing and increased neovascularization” in the experimental group.
“The transplantation of EPCs derived from human umbilical blood cells accelerated wound closure in diabetic mice from the earliest point,” said Suh.
The researchers found that growth factors and cytokines (small proteins secreted by specific cells of the immune system) were “massively produced” at the wounded skin sites and contributed to the healing process.
The study has been published in the current issue of Cell Transplantation. (ANI)
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2/24/2011 9:46:53 AM by
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An increasing number of couples are opting for stem cell banking,
discovers Zeenia F Baria
Stem Cell Expert Dr Satyen Sanghavi says that stem cells are cells found in all multi cellular organisms. They’re found throughout the body, but especially in bone marrow, in the peripheral blood (your circulating blood) and in the umbilical cord. “They are characterised by the ability to renew themselves through mitotic cell division and differentiate into a diverse range of specialised cell types. Stem cells divide themselves many times to make new stem cells. They can also transform into specific cells needed by the body to heal itself. Stem cells for transplantation can come from yourself/ your own body (an autologous transplant) or, more commonly from a donor (an allogeneic transplant). Stem cells can now be grown and transformed into specialised cells with characteristics consistent with cells of various tissues such as muscles or nerves through cell culture. Highly plastic adult stem cells from a variety of sources, including umbilical cord blood and bone marrow, are routinely used in medical therapies,” says Dr Sanghavi.
What is Stem Cell Banking?
A stem cell bank is a facility, which stores stem cells for future use. Umbilical cord blood is blood that remains in the placenta and in the attached umbilical cord after childbirth. Cord blood is obtained from the umbilical cord at the time of childbirth, after the cord has been detached from the newborn. Cord blood is collected because it contains stem cells, including hematopoietic cells, which can be used to treat hematopoietic and genetic disorders. Cord blood contains all the normal elements of blood – red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets and plasma. But it is also rich in hematopoietic (blood-forming) stem cells, similar to those found in bone marrow. This is why cord blood can be used for transplantation as an alternative to bone marrow.
Why is it recommended?
Infertility Specialist, Dr Nandita Palshetkar says that stem cell banking is a simple, safe and painless procedure and happens immediately after birth after cutting the cord. “The cord blood collected is then transferred to the laboratory and frozen in cryogenic storage tanks for long-term preservation. Nowadays, the umbilical cord is also stored. Stem cells represent an exciting area in medicine because of their potential to regenerate and repair damaged tissue. Some current therapies, such as bone marrow transplantation, already make use of stem cells and their potential for regeneration of damaged tissues. Other therapies are under investigation that involve transplanting stem cells into a damaged body part and directing them to grow and differentiate into healthy tissue,” says Dr Palshetkar.
Benefits
Storing your baby’s umbilical cord blood stem cells is an investment towards the future health of the family. “It ensures an exact match for the child and a more likely match for another blood-related family member, should the stem cells be needed for treatment. Unfortunately, if a stem cell treatment is indicated, families that have not privately banked their child’s cord blood stem cells end up searching for an appropriate source of compatible stem cells – searches, which can take months and still be unsuccessful. Cord blood stem cells from a family member are much more likely to be successfully transplanted than those from an unrelated donor,” says Dr Sanghavi.
Difference between stem cells from cord blood v/s bone marrow
Both bone marrow and cord blood stem cell transplants are designed to replace unhealthy cells with healthy ones. “Cord blood is blood that is collected from an infant’s umbilical cord after delivery, so that it may be tested, frozen and subsequently stored in a cord blood bank for future use. A bone marrow transplant, on the other hand, involves the use of bone marrow that is transplanted from a donor into the recipient in order to cultivate new stem cells. Stem cells are available in greater proportion from the umbilical cord as compared to bone marrow. Cord blood cells are have more generative capacity as compared to bone marrow cells. Cord blood cells can be used for those with lung, heart and kidney diseasewhere bone marrow cells are to be avoided,” says Dr Palshetkar.
Conclusion
Gynaecologist Dr Sonal Kumta says that more parents should opt for stem cell banking. “Cord blood can be stored by cryopreservation for future use for your child or any other family member. The baby will have a 100 per cent match with these cells and siblings will have 25 per cent match. This once in a lifetime opportunity helps preserve a biological resource for future use. It helps protect one from incurable diseases like leukemia and thalassemia while trials are in progress for Alzheimers, cartilage regeneration, diabetes, heart diseases, liver diseases, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, spinal cord injury and even strokes.
Posted:
2/23/2011 9:48:12 AM by
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COLUMBUS, Ohio — For first time in the United States, one man’s heart has been saved by his own stem cells.
It’s an amazing medical breakthrough. The science behind the technique made it possible for a man to literally save his own life through his stem cells.
John Christy is the first person in the U.S. to have his own bone marrow stem cells injected into his heart to save his heart.
“All you’re doing is giving back to yourself something you already have,” said Christy
A Vietnam veteran was suffering from severe coronary artery disease.
“I was just thinking, ‘You’re getting old, you’re just tiring out and getting weary bones.’ I felt tingling. My legs had been swelling a little bit,” said Christy.
In one procedure, cardiothoracic surgeon Joseph Woo at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine is taking science from bench to bedside. After five years of research in animals, he is now retrieving stem cells from Christy’s bone marrow and using them to grow blood vessels around the heart.
“They form brand new micro blood vessels and deliver blood flow to the heart muscle,” said Woo.
He has started the first U.S. trial where stem cells are harvested during surgery, prepped and then re-inserted back into the patient’s own heart.
Results for Christy were seen almost immediately.
“I noticed two days after my surgery, I had much more ‘umph,’” said Christy.
It’s the same process that saved 76-year-old Christina McDonald, only it wasn’t arteries in her heart that were damaged. McDonald’s problem was in her legs.
“Sort of like a charley-horse where the muscles stiffen up,” said McDonald.
The arteries in her leg were clogged with plaque, putting her at risk for heart attack, stroke and amputation.
Traditionally, doctors treat it with stents, angioplasties or bypasses. But now they’re using stem cells.
“We basically take stem cells from their hips to help grow blood vessels. It creates new, smaller blood vessels that give blood supply to the limb,” said Dr. Randall Franz, a vascular surgeon at Grant Medical Center.
It worked for McDonald. Three months later, her pain is gone.
The same goes for Christy. His only wish is that science was working faster. He lost his wife to heart disease one year ago.
“I wish that she could have had this,” said Christy.
A similar procedure is being done in Europe. The difference is Woo does his in one short surgery.
In Europe, it takes at least two procedures, weeks apart.
Woo says any patient who is a candidate for coronary bypass surgery is a good candidate for his stem-cell transplant.
Stem Cells To The Rescue! — Research Summary
CONGESTIVE HEART FAILURE:
Congestive heart failure occurs when the heart’s ability to efficiently pump is impaired by a destruction or dysfunction of its muscle cells. The condition is a major health problem, affecting 4.8 million people — a figure that is rapidly growing as 400,000 new patients arise each year. A common cause of this condition is a heart attack, which strikes over a million people in the U.S. annually. Although many surgical, medical and technological methods exist to help treat patients with congestive heart failure, over half of the patients die within five years of their primary diagnosis. (SOURCE: stemcells.nih.gov)
STEM CELL POTENTIAL:
Restoring the functionality of hearts damaged by congestive heart failure and heart attacks is one of the most challenging tasks doctors and surgeons face. Now, research has provided hope that adult and embryonic stem cells have the potential to replace the heart’s damaged muscle cells, as well as create blood vessels to route a steady supply of blood to them. To do this, heart muscle cells, such as the cardiomyocyte, which serve to push blood out of the ventricle, must be developed in order to improve blood flow and the transportation of oxygen and nutrients.
If extremely specific growth conditions are achieved in labs, then it is possible to leverage stem cells to develop new heart muscle cells. To test this concept, researchers forced a heart attack in lab rats and mice by attaching a ligature around a key blood vessel of their hearts in order to restrict the flow of nutrients and oxygen. Next, they tested the efficacy of a specific group of adult primitive bone marrow cells by injecting them directly into the damaged ventricle. To the researchers’ satisfaction, new cardiomyocytes, among other crucial heart muscle cells, began to form, leading the way for the development of a brand new system of coronary arteries, arterioles and capillaries. When compared to the control mice that also suffered heart attacks, but did not receive a stem cell treatment, the treated mice were found to be much more likely to survive. Research has shown high hopes that similar effects will blossom from human embryonic stem cells. Since embryonic cells can be coaxed into developing into any type of adult body cell, researchers hope to leverage them to take on the properties of cardiomyocytes and other cells. Embryonic cells aren’t the only solution, however. Under the right conditions, human hematopoietic stem cells are also able to transform into desired tissue types such as cardiac muscle. (SOURCE: stemcells.nih.gov)
A STEM CELL FIRST:
Y. Joseph Woo, M.D., a cardiothoracic surgeon at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine performed a first-of-its-kind procedure in the United States. He took stem cells from a patient’s bone marrow (known as endothelial progenitor stem cells) and injected them into his heart during coronary artery bypass graft surgery. The patient felt relief almost immediately. A similar procedure is being done in Europe, but doctors there retrieve the cells while the patient is awake, which can be painful.
“To find the best stem cell treatment facility in the world for your particular condition; fill out the treatment request form at the Repair Stem Cell Institute website:http://repairstemcells.org/Treatment/Treatment-Request.aspx?d=Heart%20Disease You will then be guided to the top treatment center(s) in the world for treating heart disease and educated regarding information, costs, etc. There is no cost for treatment request and info.”
Posted:
2/22/2011 9:49:48 AM by
Don Margolis | with
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Researchers Turn Skin Cells Into Beating Heart Cells
February 16th, 2011 by Peter Murray
Dr. Sheng Ding pioneered a method by which skin cells are converted to heart cells without going through an induced pluripotent stem cell state.
It’s faster, more powerful, and user-friendly. No, I’m not talking about the latest generation tablet, I’m talking about the latest upgrade in stem cell research. The transformation of adult cells from one type to another is common enough. We’ve reported on researchers successfully transforming skin cells into
heart,
blood, and
intestinal cells. This process typically involves converting the adult cell to a pluripotent, stem cell state, from which it can differentiate into one of the specialized forms. As if the cell one day realized that it never really wanted to grow up to be a skin cell, scientists could help revert it back to its infant—or, embryonic—state so it could have another go at life. A
recent study by scientists at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Californiashowcases a different method that bypasses this initial transformation to the stem cell state. Apparently you
can teach an old dog new tricks.
Over the last decade scientists have had increasing success in converting skin cells and other types of cells into something different, including heart and blood cells. Efforts are underway across the world to improve the techniques and clinical viability of these cell conversions. The work by Dr. Sheng Ding and his colleagues at Scripps qualifies as a major improvement. The road ahead still requires much work, but it’s clear that each day mankind moves closer to producing cells of every type, custom made for your body.
Faster
The novelty of the new research coming out of Scripps is not going from skin cells to heart cells beating in a dish—that stuff’s becoming
old hat—but that they accomplished it in just 11 days. It is normally a two step process that requires four to five weeks. It also requires a lot more work, owing to the step where the skin cells are converted to induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS). This is done by introducing four genes
recently discovered to reprogram differentiated adult cells to embryonic stem cell-like pluripotency. The four genes encode
transcription factors, proteins in the cell nucleus that regulate the expression of other genes. Typically the four genes are active for two to four weeks before the differentiated cell is converted to an iPS cell. Ding’s group modified this protocol by allowing the genes to work for as little as four days before deactivating them. The result are skin cells “pushed” in the direction of the induced stem cell state without actually becoming iPS cells. Turns out that’s enough, which, aside from saving time, reveals something new about stem cell biology. The current work was performed using skin cells from mice and it remains to be seen if the shortcut can be applied to human skin cells. Nevertheless, to render the iPS cell stage unnecessary is a major paradigm change for the field and it will be interesting to see if the new paradigm bolsters progress in the near future.
You can see the beating cells in a video below from newsy.com’s coverage of the study:
More Powerful
In addition to being faster, Ding’s protocol boosts efficiency. The old protocol yields an
estimated maximum of approximately 0.2 heart cells for every skin cell plated. Skipping the iPS cell stage yields a whopping 1.2 heart cells per skin cell. In the paper the team speculates that the increased efficiency is due to the generation of
mitotically active cells which are able to divide and multiply. Resembling heart precursor cells, they speculate further that “these intermediate cells, if successfully isolated and stabilized in culture, could become an expandable and renewable source for not just cardiomyocytes, but many other terminally differentiated cardiovascular cells as well.” In the paper they extend this thought, suggesting that the principle of a versatile intermediate might be important, not only for creating the numerous types of cells that go into making a heart, but for stem cell applications in all tissues.
User Friendly
The four genes that researchers use to produce the iPS cells is risky because these same genes can
turn cells into tumors. Inactivating them after only a few days instead of a couple weeks reduces this risk. And, like any self-respecting technology, an upgrade is in the making. Because they can turn cells cancerous, stem cell researchers have been searching for a way to reprogram differentiated cells into iPS cells without using the four genes altogether. Demonstrating that the genes are only needed for a few days instead of weeks simplifies the problem and makes the genes easier to replace.
To be sure, stem cell research has a lot of ground to cover before it becomes an effective treatment for disease. For example, the current study was done in mice and it remains to be seen whether or not the shortened protocol produces the same results in human cells. I find it impressive, however, that the four genes widely used by researchers to convert fully-differentiated, adult cells into embryonic-like, pluripotent stem cells were
discovered less than five years ago. Since then iPS cells have been gotten by converting other cells besides skin, including cells from the
stomach and liver. The current study was the first that we are aware of to bypass the iPS cell stage for differentiation to heart cells, but this shortcut has already been taken for
differentiation into blood cells. It is exciting to note that human cells were used in that study.
But in case you hadn’t heard, stem cells have already been used in tissue replacement therapies. We’ve previously reported on
tracheal transplants of two women. This involved a donor trachea (from a cadaver) that was coated with a layer of the patients’ stem cells which fostered regrowth of the trachea. Because the new layer of cells originated from the patient the risk of an immune response against the new trachea was minimized.
From my vantage point, it seems that stem cell therapies are inevitable. I also believe that the day is long in coming. Unfortunately it seems that many people have been set up to hope for miracles after the hyperbolic political battles over stem cell research in the past. But therapies rarely come from sudden miracles. Instead it is the incremental advances and shifts in paradigm, such as that achieved by Ding and his colleagues, that will bring us the stem cell therapies we are hoping for.
[image credit: The Scripps Research Institute]
[video credits: newsy.com]
Scientists at the Scripps Research Institute needed just eleven days to convert skin cells in beating heart cells.
“To find the best stem cell treatment facility in the world for your particular condition; fill out the treatment request form at the Repair Stem Cell Institute website:http://repairstemcells.org/Treatment/Treatment-Request.aspx?d=Heart%20Disease You will then be guided to the top treatment center(s) in the world for treating heart disease and educated regarding information, costs, etc. There is no cost for treatment request and info.”
Posted:
2/21/2011 9:47:52 AM by
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“Transplanting autologous renal progenitor cells (RPCs), (kidney stem cells derived from self-donors), into rat models with kidney damage from pyelonephritis – a type of urinary infection that has reached the kidney – has been found to improve kidney structure and function.”
Stem cell transplants help kidney damage
Tampa, Fla. (Feb. 14, 2011) – Transplanting autologous renal progenitor cells (RPCs), (kidney stem cells derived from self-donors), into rat models with kidney damage from pyelonephritis – a type of urinary infection that has reached the kidney – has been found to improve kidney structure and function. The study, authored by a research team from the Tehran University of Medical Sciences, is published in the current issue of Cell Medicine [1(3)] and is freely available on-line at: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cog/cm .
“Advancements in stem cell therapies and tissue engineering hold great promise for regenerative nephrology,” said Dr. Abdol-Mohammad Kajbafzadeh, corresponding author. “Our RPC transplant study demonstrated benefits for pyelonephritis, a disease characterized by severe inflammation, renal function impairment and eventual scarring, and which remains a major cause of end-stage-renal disease worldwide.”
The researchers divided 27 rats into three groups, two of which were modeled with an induced pyelonephritis in their right kidneys, while the third group did not have induced disease. RPCs were obtained from the diseased animals’ left kidneys and injected into the right kidney six weeks later. Two weeks after injection, tubular atrophy was reduced. After four weeks, fibrosis was reduced and after sixty days, right renal tissue integrity was “significantly improved.”
“We propose that kidney augmentation was mainly due to functional tissue regeneration following cellular transplantation,” said Dr. Kajbafzadeh. “Kidney-specific stem/progenitor cells might be the most appropriate candidates for transplantation because of their inherent organ-specific differentiation and their capacity to modulate tissue remodeling in chronic nephropathies.”
The researchers concluded that because renal fibrosis is a common and ultimate pathway leading to end-stage renal disease, amelioration of fibrosis might be of major clinical relevance.
“Transplanting RPCs showed the potential for partial augmentation of kidney structure and function in pyelonephritis,” said Dr. Kajbafzadeh. “This is one of the first studies to demonstrate improved renal function after cell transplantation. The translation of this study into larger clinical models will be very relevant to validate the success of this small animal study.” said Dr. Amit Patel, Section Editor Cell Medicine, Associate Professor of Surgery, University of Utah.
Citation. Kajbafzadeh, A-M.; Elmi, A.; Talab, S. S.; Sadeghi, Z.; Emami, H.; Sotoudeh, M. Autografting of Renal Progenitor Cells Ameliorates Kidney Damage in Experimental Model of Pyelonephritis. Cell Med. 1(3): 115-122; 2010. Stem cell transplants help kidney damage
Posted:
2/18/2011 9:40:20 AM by
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A Palos Hills vet leaned on a colleague for an innovative treatment for her own dog.
By Cristel Mohrman
Credit Cristel Mohrman
As a veterinarian, Leslie Dahl knows the obstacles that aging pets can face. And as a pet owner, she has watched her own dog battle the stairs with arthritic hips.
But if all goes as planned, her dog will soon be walking pain-free. Doodle, a German shepherd, became a guinea pig, so to speak, as the first animal in Illinois to undergo a one-day, in-clinic stem cell procedure.
Dr. Mitch Robbins conducted the procedure on Friday at Buffalo Grove’s Veterinary Specialty Center, where he removed fat tissue from Doodle’s abdominal area and used the center’s newest technology to inject the dog’s hip joints with her own stem cells.
“The reason that it works is that those cells that we’re removing and processing and stimulating are cells that are normally associated with the healing process and the inflammatory process in the body,” Robbins said. “So they go into the joint, they reduce some of the inflammation in the joint, they improve and reduce pain, they improve range of motion, they improve use of the joint.”
While the Buffalo Grove clinic has performed about 40 such regenerative therapy procedures over the past four years, until now the extracted materials were shipped off-site for preparation, resulting in a more drawn out and expensive process.
Last week, Veterinary Specialty Center adopted new technology from Kentucky-based MediVet-America, which allows medical professionals to complete the entire process in-house over the course of just a few hours.
Katherine Wilkie, MediVet-America’s lab services director, guided Buffalo Grove’s team through the process, which involves using machinery to separate stem cells from the rest of the animal’s tissue and cleaning it so that it can be re-injected.
While professionals received instruction, Doodle, still groggy from the tissue extraction, waited in a nearby cage. By the end of the day, she was picked up by Dahl, who brought her back to their Oak Park home.
Over the next few weeks, she is expected to regain her mobility, which has been hindered by bilateral hip dysplasia and osteoarthritis.
“With the stem cells, we’re hoping that they buy her some quality relief and improve her quality of life,” said Dahl, who is a veterinarian at Southwest Animal Care Center in Palos Hills. “I want her to be able to play and the next day not have any of the post-exercise inflammation that she’s having now.”
Robbins emphasized that stem cell treatment will not cure arthritis,but in most cases the procedure eases his four-legged patients’ discomfort. He said the treatment has benefited about 75 percent of his patients, and two-thirds have no longer needed pain medication.
That is especially important to pet owners like Dahl, whose German shepherd’s sensitive stomach won’t tolerate more traditional treatments. Last spring, she brought Doodle to Veterinary Specialty Center for collagen gel injections that noticeably improved the dog’s condition. When Doodle’s discomfort returned in recent months and Dahl learned that the treatment was no longer available, she jumped at the chance to test out the stem cell process.
“We’re going to do what we can to make sure she’s with us as long as possible,” Dahl said.
Robbins said stem cell therapy is generally effective for about 18 months. Extra cells are collected during the initial extraction and stored for subsequent injections, he said.
“They are never going to cure the arthritis, but they should do a very good job of controlling the pain that Doodle has, allowing her to resume a better, more normal quality of life,” he said.
MediVet-America’s technology was introduced in the U.S. May 2010, and it is now being used in 23 states, Wilkie said, with one or two procedures taking place in the U.S. each day.
Doctors report success rates ranging from 75 percent to 90 percent, Wilkie said.
The procedure costs about $1,800; nearly $1,000 less than the expense of a multiple-day procedure, which involves the costs of sending the tissue to outside labs.
Robbins said he expects to use the new technology to benefit 20 to 50 dogs and cats per year.
Posted:
2/17/2011 9:53:54 AM by
Don Margolis | with
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There are four approaches to heart transplants:
1. Wait for a donor heart
2. Insert a plastic heart
3. Implant adult stem cells
4. "More radically, Dr Doris Taylor, of the University of Minnesota, has been using stem cells to actually build new hearts in the laboratory. She has achieved this with a rat heart by stripping it of its cells, then re-populating the resulting perfectly heart-shaped scaffold with stem cells, which adapt into heart tissue, so that in time the heart begins to beat again.
".. the thought would be that we would take a heart, probably from a pig .. wash all the cells out, and then take your cells and grow enough of them to .. build a heart that matches your body and have it transplanted into you. That's the home run," says Dr Taylor.
The man with a plastic heart
By Dr Kevin Fong Consultant Anaesthetist, UCL Hospital 
The demand for heart transplants cannot keep pace with demand
Heart disease threatens the lives of millions, but with only limited hearts available for transplant, medical science has long yearned for a definitive fix to repair or replace this most vital organ.
Troy Golden, a pastor from Oklahoma, was born with a heart that would one day break. A genetic condition known as Marfan's syndrome has been slowly attacking his body tissue since birth including around his heart and valves.
At the age of 41, he had to undergo life-saving surgery, replacing valves and reshaping his heart's walls. But his condition continued to worsen. In January 2010, he was put on the heart transplant list, but time ran out without a donor.
Troy Golden carries a pump in his backpack for his plastic heart
"Troy's heart was so bad that a traditional heart pump wouldn't be enough," explains Troy's cardiologist Dr Doug Horstmanshof. "So, we decided to try something different - completely replacing the heart."
In September last year, Troy became one of the few people in the US to have his entire heart replaced with a device called the Total Artificial Heart. It's made of plastic and weighs 160 grams and is a little larger than a biological heart. It is powered by a pneumatic pump that you carry around in a rucksack.
Awe inspiring moment
Dr James Long, Troy's surgeon, recalled the moment the heart was implanted into Troy. "It was admittedly rather awe-inspiring," he says. And it was ominous to look inside the chest and know that the only thing keeping him alive was the synthetic pump that we had just replaced his heart with."
Troy has had to get used to the non-stop sound of the pneumatic pump. But he looks and feels remarkably well and is overwhelmed by what has been done for him.
"It's awesome," he said "to be out of the hospital and to be able to come back home and to be able to come back to some normal life."
"You can't even just really comprehend taking your heart out, you know, without a heart you're not alive."
The Total Artificial Heart has done more than buy Troy some time. It has given him his life back and it has given him hope. But this is not a permanent solution. His heart's batteries must be constantly charged, spares must stand at the ready. The risk of infection and clotting add to the constant worry.
Medical challenge
For now Troy must again endure the long wait for a donor heart, but there are other solutions on the horizon. New avenues of research are focussing on efforts to assist, rather than replace the heart.
Dr Kevin Fong presents Horizon: How to Mend a Broken Heart on BBC Two, on Monday 14 February at 2100 GMT
Increasingly, in patients suffering from heart failure, miniaturised pumps are being used to assist heart function. They are about the size of a cigar and are essentially plugged into the main pumping chamber of the heart to help it along.
Unlike Troy's artificial heart, they can be left in place indefinitely. But perhaps more remarkable is the fact that these pumps can sometime be removed, once a damaged heart has recovered.
And it is the potential for hearts to actually recover, after having been damaged, that is being investigated in some of the most exciting research going on today.
Much interest centres on stem cells because they are the closest natural thing to the body' s spare parts and, under the right conditions, they have the potential to transform into a huge number of different cell types with specialised functions. Because of this, they can take part in the process of renewal - replacing diseased and damaged tissues.
Preliminary results are highly controversial, but there is a growing body of evidence that suggests we may in the future be able to harness the heart's potential regenerative capacity for future therapies.
Growing new hearts
More radically, Dr Doris Taylor, of the University of Minnesota, has been using stem cells to actually build new hearts in the laboratory.
She has achieved this with a rat heart by stripping it of its cells, then re-populating the resulting perfectly heart-shaped scaffold with stem cells, which adapt into heart tissue, so that in time the heart begins to beat again.
".. the thought would be that we would take a heart, probably from a pig .. wash all the cells out, and then take your cells and grow enough of them to .. build a heart that matches your body and have it transplanted into you. That's the home run," says Dr Taylor.
If the clinical application can be made to work, it is a revolutionary if relatively distant possibility.
For Troy and the millions of people like him for whom heart failure is a reality, this work is of vital importance.
There is the very real possibility here that, within our lifetimes, scientists might finally find the cure they're looking for.
While their search for that magic bullet remedy is far from at an end, each new discovery brings them another step closer.
Stem Cell Treatments and Heart Disease - http://repairstemcell.wordpress.com/heart-disease-treatment/
Posted:
2/16/2011 9:47:29 AM by
Don Margolis | with
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