CHANDLER TEEN HAS FIRST AZ STEM-CELL SPINAL OPERATION
Arizona Daily Star/ West
Chandler teen has first AZ stem-cell spinal operation
By Mary K. Reinhart - East Valley Tribune
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 12.15.2007
MESA ‚ Matthew Baremore woke up Tuesday morning, finished his book report on a Tom Clancy novel, and prepared to make medical history. The 14-year-old Chandler boy, who has scoliosis, became the first in the state to undergo spinal fusion surgery using a concentrated cocktail of his own stem cells and donated bone.
The stem-cell technology speeds healing and helps Matthew's body to grow new bone along his curving spine. It also averts the need for a second procedure to harvest a piece of Matthew's bone‚¦
During the four-hour operation at Banner Desert Children's Hospital, Dr. Mark Flood, a pediatric spine surgeon, harvested bone marrow from the teen's pelvic bones. Stem cells were extracted from the marrow using centrifuge technology patented by a firm in Austin, Texas.
Flood straightened and bolstered Matthew's spine with a series of rods and pins ‚ a typical surgical treatment for severe scoliosis. Then the surgeon combined Matthew's own stem cells, which had been concentrated to pack about 10 times more cells than the traditional method, with crushed bone from the hospital bone bank.
He injected the puttylike mixture into the upper-middle section of Matthew's spine, between the rods, where the mixture will grow into bone and protect the spine against further curvature.
"What's revolutionary is the use of the concentrated stem cells," Flood said before the surgery. "We can avoid the pain of taking bone, and increase fusion."
To read the complete article:
http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/216362
STEM CELL PATCHES TO HEAL DAMAGED HEARTS
Heartzine.com - Volume: 35 (14/12/2007)
Researchers at the Imperial College in London have come up with a breakthrough technology that can help repair damage caused to the heart after an attack. The breakthrough is in the form of a stem-cell patch that can be stitched or glued over the damaged area of the heart‚¦
‚“That is a very promising development,‚ Dr. Harding said. ‚“They have made heart muscles from those cells and this technique has the potential both for getting round the ethical problems and for producing patient-specific cells.‚ She believes stem cells derived from a patient's own tissue would ensure there would be no danger of rejection of the transplant.
To read the complete article:
http://www.heartzine.com/719-Stem-Cell-Patches-to-Heal-Damaged-Hearts.html
THE PURPOSE OF THIS BLOG
In this blog, if nothing else, I want to share a monumentally significant truth because I know that it may change both the way you live and the manner in which you die. If I impress nothing else on you, I want you to gain knowledge of one simple truth.
To date,
Adult stem cells have successfully treated 73 diseases around the world
73 diseases believed to be “incurable in the United States!
Embryonic stem cells have successfully treated none![i],[ii]
The world is embracing the research and successful treatments of diseases with Adult stem cells, reaping huge rewards of life extension, improved quality of life and the curing of so-called incurable diseases. The USA continues to be locked in an unwinnable argument over embryonic stem cells. I couldn't believe that Americans are so unaware of the options and alternatives available to them now. So I created a personal and for the duration of six months I took an informal survey, speaking to every janitor, school teacher and business man, every doctor (yes doctors too); every butcher, baker and candlestick maker. All walks of life were included, all levels of education and all occupations. My hope was that Americans were more aware of the medical accomplishments going on in the world around them than they appeared to be. And if they were more aware, why were they choosing to not avail themselves of the options?
For better or worse, the overwhelming consensus was:
1. Embryonic stem cells are the only stem cells available, being researched and used to treat human beings.
2. Embryonic alone have shown potential success at treating disease.
The plain and disturbing truth is that Americans know less about Adult stem cells and their life saving properties than 10th graders the world over. Simply put, Americans are not choosing health, recuperation and life; over illness decompensation and death because they just don't know the choices available to them.
THIS MUST END!
The purpose of this blog is to educate the world and especially Americans about the existence of Adult stem cells and the fact that 5 continents (other than North America, north of the Rio Grande) have been treating human patients with diseases that are believed to be incurable in only within North America. And they have been doing so successfully, by any standard, in some locations, for over 10 years.
Adult stem cells have proven to be life improving and/or life enhancing and/or life saving. Before you read this list, understand that for some diseases, i.e. heart and diabetes, one or two stem cell implants usually does the trick. But newly discovered neurological disease treatments, i.e. Spinal Cord Injury, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, etc., 5 to 10 stem cell implants are necessary over a period of 5+ years.... very difficult if you live in Paducah and the closest treatment in a world-class hospital is in China.
Adult stem cell therapies available on five continents are giving thousands of once-dying CARDIAC patients a new, energized life. MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS is being treated on three continents; SPINAL CORD INJURIES ("Christopher Reeve's disease), is being successfully treated a half-hour's drive from our southern border, plus all over Asia, and even in Argentina; DIABETES treatments are spreading over the world like wildfire; ALS or LOU GEHRIG'S DISEASE is also being treated, but ironically, only in countries that never heard of Lou Gehrig; ALZHEIMERS, a half dozen forms of BLINDNESS, and even AUTISM.
Odds are, if you are an American, you know nothing about this and worse, your teachers, advisors, medical mentors, sources for medical knowledge and even your doctors - don't either. Why? Because virtually all the accounts of these successes have been strangely absent from all the major US media and medical journals.
In the recent December 3rd, 2007, issue of Newsweek, there is an article entitled:
“Reality Check on an Embryonic Debate
So skin cells can turn into stem cells. That doesn't mean cures are in sight.
Paul Nurse (President of Rockefeller University and a Nobelist in Medicine) is quoted from when he addressed the New York Stem Cell Foundation conference in November of 2007: “Opponents [of embryonic stem cell research] recognized that this was an overselling of the technology¦The typical time between such a discovery and a new drug is at least 15 years.
I, myself, did not believe that number, so I worked on it myself. The result is my recent article, “The Stem Cell Story of the Year. Click at the bottom of this post if you would like to read this 3-page article.
The choice is simple. If your health is such that you feel you can wait 15 years for a cure, I wish you good continued health and the best of luck. BUT, if you can't wait 15 years for a cure and your doctor tells you all options have been exhausted, please remember:
To date,
Adult stem cells have successfully treated 73 diseases around the world
73 diseases believed to be “incurable in the United States!
And they have barely scratched the surface!
Embryonic stem cells have successfully treated none!
Please view this science-based video:
http://www.micatholicconference.org/mcc_photos/displayimage.php?album=12&pos=0
Educate yourself about the wonders of Adult stem cell treatments available now! Learn that which may ultimately allow you to reclaim your ability to choose what is best for your health, based on ALL of the available facts and treatments! Read my blog: www.donrmargolis.com/blog. For your education and convenience, we are constantly updating www.donrmargolis.com/blog with new articles on the latest available science of Adult stem cells, editorial commentary on the state of stem cell research around the world, links, videos, etc. And if you review the information there and still have questions, please feel free to email us at info@donrmargolis.com
Remember:
you learned it at www.donrmargolis.com/blog!
There is a great deal for all of us to learn on the life-changing subject of Adult stem cells, so please stay tuned. Please submit your email address if you would like receive our free newsletter and be kept abreast of current developments. Pass our site and the information within on to the people you care about. Some day, they may have one of these diseases and have to make a life-changing decision about their health and treatment. Before they do, wouldn't you want them to know ALL of the choices available to them?
Click here to read "The Stem Cell Story of the Year": http://donrmargolis.com/blog/?cat=8
[i] http://www.stemcellresearch.org/facts/asc-refs.pdf
[ii] http://www.stemcellresearch.org/facts/treatments.htm
I WANT TO THANK DON MARGOLIS
To all-
I want to thank Don Margolis for giving me a venue to express some of my feelings about stem cells. I have the greatest respect for Mr. Margolis, his past accomplishments with treating congestive heart failure patients with stem cells virtually before anyone in the US was even thinking of it and his current efforts to dispel the mass confusion about stem cells that is rampant in the USA. My motivation is that I believe the US government and medical industry is missing the biggest opportunity for healing millions of people since...well, ever. If that's not a good reason to "blog for change", I don't know what is.
While I don't promise that my posts will always be scientific and clinically grounded, I can virtually guarantee that they always will be irreverent and probably entertaining. In the best tradition of blogging, because I love America and because this country is based upon the tenants of freedom of speech and I intend to proudly wrap myself in those rights and wear them until and beyond when the stitches are loose and the fabric is threadbare. That is all that I will promise to you. You may not agree with everything I say or the way I say it but that, as they say, is your problem not mine.
As Howard Stern said: "the show was never about shocking people, but primarily intended to offer (my) honest opinions on a gamut of issues." Within that context, I want to be the Howard Stern of Stem Cells. That, and if you actually think about what I have written you may realize that there is a lot more there than your gut tells you at first glance.
If that is a problem for you, I suggest you stop reading right now.
For those that have the courage to forge ahead, face reality and put an unflinching and honest microscope up to all things "stem cell-ian" that most people take for granted, then hold onto your seat, it's going to be a wild ride!
Regards-
"Mad About Stem Cells"