“Latest Stem Cells News”

Sufferers from the debilitating bowel condition Crohn‘s disease may be cured using a groundbreaking stem cell treatment, according to the British doctor leading the research.

Initial findings from the world’s first controlled trial of the procedure have raised hopes that it could banish the disease’s symptoms for many years in up to half of the patients who undergo it.

The pioneering therapy involves “rebooting” the patient’s immune system, by first destroying the cells that have attacked it to cause the Crohn’s, and then replacing them.

Professor Chris Hawkey, a gastroenterologist at Nottingham University, is leading the Autologous Stem Cell Transplantation in Crohn’s Disease (Astic) trial. So far, 15 patients from six European countries, including three Britons, have taken part, though others are being recruited.

“I’m hopeful that half or more of the patients who undergo stem cell transplantation may either be cured or have a long-term remission,” said Hawkey.

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Stem Cell Research continues to show that Adult Stem Cells can help Dilated Cardiomyopathy patients. Before Adult Stem Cell treatment, there really was no treatment for cardiomyopathy, just a drug regimen to minimize the symptoms of the dreaded heart disease eventually resulting in congestive heart failure and then a heart transplant or death.

Adult Stem Cells Giving Hope

Adult Stem Cell research has given us new hope. Patients like Leonard Narracci are living examples of how this new stem cell therapy can help. Leonard previously wrote me and informed me of his stem cell treatment for his cardiomyopathy and congestive heart failure on October 8th, 2008. He reported that 7 weeks after his treatment, his ejection fraction (a measure of the heart’s pumping ability) had gone from 18% all the way to 33%.  Not only that, he had  renewed energy and sense of well-being that he had not experienced in 3 years!

That was in December- 3 months after the stem cell research had worked its magic on Leonard.  Now, more than 6 months after the adult stem cells were implanted, Leonard has more good news.

6 Months After Stem Cell Treatment- Good News!

His ejection fraction has gone up from 18% before treatment to 51% 6 months post stem cell treatment.

From the stem cell press release:

It goes against traditional theory that we should try to fix damaged heart muscle, but we are generating new heart tissue with impressive results that improve cardiac function and quality of life,” said Dr. Leonel Fernandez Liriano, Professor of Medicine at Pontifical Catholic University School of Medicine (PCUSM), and the head of the cardiology team that treated the patient with adult stem cells.

Grekos states, “After comparing this patient’s echocardiogram and MUGA nuclear scans before and after treatment, we are very pleased to see a profound increase in cardiac function.”

More on Stem Cell Research for Dilated Cardiomyopathy

Good to hear from Leonard again.  We also covered 2 other dilated cardiomyopathy and congestive heart failure patients who are doing well after adult stem cell therapy- Mike Rumble and Dan Jackson.

original post by Don Margolis

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The Ospedali Riuniti of Bergamo is the top center for the collection of umbilical cord blood in the Lombardy region, said the hospital, which received an award at the Policlinico di Milano (where the umbilical cord blood bank is located) for the second consecutive year for its commitment and professionalism with which it carries out its work, providing an important source of stem cells.

“Our collection program started in 2004,” explained Bruna Pasini, the head obstetrician, also in charge of the collection of umbilical cord blood for the hospital. “At that time we started to collaborate with the Milano Cord Blood Bank, which allowed us to collect over 1,000 units of blood.”

The remaining blood in the placenta after birth contains stem cells similar to those in the bone marrow. They are considered the new frontier to treat many diseases. “About 40-50% of patients with leukemia and lymphomas, who need bone marrow transplants,” explained Mariangelo Cossolini, the organ and tissue transplant coordinator for the province of Bergamo, “do not find compatible donors in their family or in the international registry of voluntary bone marrow donors. Therefore, umbilical cord blood is very precious because it can replace marrow in stem cell transplants and is able to regenerate bone marrow and the entire immune system.”

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Discarded fallopian tubes from hysterectomies could be a good source of donor stem cells, say researchers.
Work shows they are an abundant source of the immature cells that have the potential to become a variety of the body’s tissues, like muscle and bone.

The discovery offers another “ethical” route to creating stem cell treatments for diseases like arthritis without using embryos.
The findings are published in The Journal of Translational Medicine.
Experts have already shown that getting mesenchymal stem cells from umbilical cords, menstrual blood, teeth and fat tissue is viable.

Discarded tissue

The latest work by a Brazilian team from the University of São Paulo suggests fallopian tubes, discarded during the course of hysterectomies or female sterilisation operations, can be added to this list.
Once harvested, the scientists were able to multiply and then coax the mesenchymal stem cells to turn into apparently healthy muscle, fat, cartilage and bone cell lines in the lab.

Given that these adult stem cells are capable of replacing damaged cells in the fallopian tube, the researchers envisage the cells could be useful for understanding and treating fertility problems as well as providing a source of stem cells for regenerative medicine.
However, it will still take more time and research before cells like these could be given to patients.

Much of the work on stem cells has focused on those taken from embryos as they have an unlimited capacity to become any of the types of cells and tissue in the human body – a so-called pluripotent state.
But campaigners have objected to their use on the grounds that it is unethical to destroy embryos in the name of science.

Stem cell expert Stephen Minger, of Kings College London, said: “This is another promising source to add to the list of so-called ‘ethical’ sources of stem cells.”
But he pointed out that bone marrow and fat were more accessible less intrusive sources.

Josephine Quintavalle of Comment on Reproductive Ethics said: “Obtaining multi-potent stem cells from discarded fallopian tubes is yet another example of the extraordinary potential of human waste tissue.
“Hopefully these cells could also be used to repair damaged fallopian tubes, which are so often a major contributor to female infertility.”

from BBC news

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It works in racehorses. Who knows if it’s possible in humans. A technique using stem cells to repair damage to the Achilles tendon is about to be tested in Great Britain.

British biotech company MedCell Bioscience has announced that it will begin human testing in the next six months and expects to perform a broad study in various European hospitals in 2011.

Patients will receive injections containing millions of their own stem cells extracted and multiplied in the lab to regenerate damaged tissue. Over 1,500 racehorses have been treated with the same procedure and the results have given researchers a reason to be optimistic. They indicate a 50% reduction in relapses in the next three years compared to conventional treatments.

“The passage from the veterinary clinic to human medicine is uncommon,” said Nicola Maffulli, an Italian orthopedic surgeon known as the ‘tendon king’, an expert in sports medicine who has been living in England for years. Maffulli will be collaborating in the human testing. “Normally testing goes the other way.” Stem cell therapy to repair damage to the Achilles tendon has become very popular in racehorses, where animals worth millions of dollars race against one another. The technique was used for the first time by surgeons at the Royal Veterinary College in London.

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While America continues to waste put its money into Embryonic Stem Cell research, a doctor in Iraq is actually treating patients with their own Adult Stem Cells.   Dr. Abdul Majeed Alwan Hammadi is treating patients for free- and has so far treated 34 patients with stem cell therapy and treatment, mainly patients with Multiple Sclerosis.

Dr. Hammadi claims no side effects have been reported in his patients and this isn’t surprising because it is the patient’s own stem cells he is using.

We covered Dr. Hammadi briefly last month when he was treating  Reverend Andrew White, the vicar for St. George’s church in Baghdad.  Reverend Andrew was suffering from multiple sclerosis before his stem cell treatment.

Reverend Andrew had no qualms about using his own Adult Stem Cells for his treatment because they were cells from his own body, already designed to repair damage.

Dr. Hammadi started treating Reverend Andrew in January 2009.  Since then (from the stem cell article):

White said his slurred speech and other MS symptoms improved since starting the three-hour therapy sessions, which involves Hammadi extracting adult stem cells from White’s blood and then injecting them into his spinal cord.

“When there’s no other treatment, you kind of just go with it,” White said. “At least there’s a chance.”

White said the therapy itself “can be a bit painful” since it involves a spinal cord puncture, but there has been a “massive difference” in his condition.

“It’s very rare for me to actually feel ill now,” he said. “My balance is still quite bad and my vision is not perfect, but I do not feel ill.”

Look at this.  In the middle of a warzone, a doctor is treating patients with their own Adult Stem Cells for free.  While in the peaceful United States, too busy with their Embryonic stem cell research, multiple sclerosis patients wait (and suffer) for the right to use their own stem cells for treatment. Is there something wrong with this picture?

original post by Don Margolis

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