“Latest Stem Cells News”

IntelliCell BioSciences filed its patent application with the US Patent office that will claim priority to its provisional US patent serial #61/427, 221 that was filed on December 27, 2010. The title of the patent application is Ultrasonic Cavitation Derived Stromal or Mesenchymal Vascular Extracts and Cells Derived Therefrom Obtained from Adipose Tissue and use Thereof. It covers the methods of manufacturing using ultrasonic cavitation to dissociate the fat cells and blood vessels contained within the adipose tissue, thereby obtaining multi-potent, mesenchymal or stromal vascular fractions for use in human subjects. These methods do not include the use of any exogenous dissociating enzymes such as collagenase and result in increased number of cells which constitute the multi-potent, mesenchymal or stromal vascular fractions (about ten folds greater than methods which use collagenase to isolate these cells).

Dr. Steven Victor, the inventor, and CEO of IntelliCell BioSciences commented “we are extremely excited to have filed this patent in the US and around the world. The use of ultrasonic cavitation allows physicians to use less than 60cc’s of adipose tissue (fat) to manufacture approximately a half billion to 1.4 billion stromal vascular fraction cells (SVF cells) within five to ten minutes. The use of sound and water allows this manufacturing method to be utilized by physicians in the US underneath FDA (PHS Act Section 361 1271.10 (a)) of the health bill passed by Congress in 2009.

This manufacturing method has significant cost and time advantages over any other method of producing SVF cells. These cells have been used around the world for conditions caused by inflammation, such as lower back pain, migraines, MS, autism, fibromyalgia, tinnitus, arthritis; tissue repair, such as growing cartilage for bone on bone knee repair; bone and gingival tissue (gum disease): cosmetic indications such as fat grafting, wrinkle removal and other cosmetic procedures. The success rate for these patients has been approximately 80% plus. We believe that the use of non-enzymatic SVF cell therapy will find its first applications in treating sports related injuries. We are proud to have numerous luminaries on our advisory board who are leaders in the sports medicine world. We anticipate significant revenues from the utilization of SVF cells from the various IntelliCell BioSciences Centers of Excellence in the year 2012.

Scientists at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI) and the University of Ottawa have discovered a powerful new way to stimulate muscle regeneration, paving the way for new treatments for debilitating conditions such as muscular dystrophy.

The research, to be published in the June 5 issue of Cell Stem Cell, shows for the first time that a protein called Wnt7a increases the number of stem cells in muscle tissue, leading to accelerated growth and repair of skeletal muscle.

“This discovery shows us that by targeting stem cells to boost their numbers, we can improve the body’s ability to repair muscle tissue,” said senior author Dr. Michael Rudnicki. Dr. Rudnicki is the Scientific Director of Canada’s Stem Cell Network and a Senior Scientist at OHRI and Director of OHRI’s Sprott Centre for Stem Cell Research, as well as a Professor of Medicine at the University of Ottawa.

Stem cells give rise to every tissue and organ in the body. Satellite stem cells are specialized muscle stem cells that live in adult skeletal muscle tissue and have the ability to both replicate and differentiate into various types of muscle cells. Dr. Rudnicki’s team found that the Wnt7a protein, when introduced into mouse muscle tissue, significantly increased the population of these satellite stem cells and fueled the regeneration process, creating bigger and stronger muscles. Muscle tissue mass was increased by nearly 20 per cent in the study.

“Our findings point the way to the development of new therapeutic treatment for muscular diseases such as muscular dystrophy, sarcopenia and muscle wasting conditions resulting from extended hospital stays and surgeries,” said Dr. Rudnicki.

from physorg

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Flip past the big photo on page 65 of beaming software magnate Bill Gates and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and there, on page 67, beside a picture of U.S. president Barack Obama, is a microscope image of a cell.

That induced embryonic stem cell has vaulted Toronto scientist Andras Nagy into this high-flying company in Scientific Magazine’s inaugural Top 10 awards for work in science-related endeavours.

“It’s an enormous honour and a recognition of the science we do in the lab, and what we do in Mount Sinai, and what we do in Toronto and what we do in Canada,” says Nagy, an investigator at Mount Sinai Hospital who nabbed his award for a genetic coup, announced in February, that may well change the face of stem-cell biology.

Nagy’s team at Mount Sinai’s Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute won a global race to find a safe way to transform adult skin cells into embryonic-like stem cells.

While it had been shown before that this reprogramming could be achieved, past methods had dangerously contaminated the resulting stem cell, Nagy explains.

He says under previous methods, the new stem cells, which like the real embryonic version can transform into any tissue type, still contained the reprogramming material and the DNA of the viruses used to transport it into the adult cell’s nucleus.

His method, however, enables scientists to introduce the reprogramming material without a viral transporter and then draw it back out again after it has accomplished the transformation.

“In effect, Nagy and his colleagues had, for the first time, created the equivalent of embryonic stem cells that were uncontroversially ethical, safe and efficient,” the magazine wrote in the June issue, released today.

Using patients’ own transformed cells for organ repair would allow them to avoid the immune system rejection that plagues all person-to person transplantation.

Nagy, for one, sees a legitimate fit to his prestigious Obama pairing.

“The heavy science that we do at Mount Sinai for humanity is there beside (Obama’s) massive, massive message that science is important for society and the economy,” Nagy said.

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Alex Normandin, 26, of Montreal, Canada has been cured of his Multiple Sclerosis following the implantation of his own Adult Stem Cells. The stem cell therapy was done in conjunction with a research program in Ottawa with Dr. Mark Freedman.

A medical student, Alex was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis more than 2 years ago and was distressed to learn that he had the aggressive form of MS and was on track to be in a wheelchair in a matter of months.

Process of Stem Cells for Multiple Sclerosis in Canada

Luckily, he was accepted into Dr. Freedman’s stem cell research program at Ottawa General Hospital. In this stem cell program, the patient is first given chemotherapy to kill off the immune system. Then, the stem cell transplant takes place to “reboot” the immune system.

From the stem cell article:

Normandin became patient 19. His transplant took place in December 2008. It worked.

Not only does the disease appear to have stopped its progression, but Normandin says he feels his co-ordination and strength improving.

Normandin is buoyed by the treatment’s eight-year track record — none of the 24 patients have suffered a relapse or a brain lesion. (The article fails to mention the one patient who died from the chemo)

Stem Cell Therapy in China Quote Remembered

Readers of this blog may remember Dr. Freedman from this Multiple Sclerosis Stem Cell post in which he commented on stem cell therapy in China:

Dr. Freedman is concerned that patients are forking over large amounts of money for unproven treatments like this, especially when there is no follow-up care or monitoring when they get home.

“It’s dangerous in the wrong hands,” he said. “The only reason these places could be in existence is to take people’s money and offer them something that’s unproven.”

I called that the “Most Hypocritical Statement So Far in 2009″ then, and I will stick to that for the following reasons:

1. Chemotherapy is dangerous.  1 of Dr. Freedman’s patients died while receiving it before the stem cell transplant- to call another treatment dangerous (which doesn’t use chemo, by the way) is hypocritical.
2. He says the therapies are unproven and only in existence to take people’s money-  however, in this article- it is revealed not only is his own treatment unproven, but it also is not free, in fact, far from free- “The trial procedure costs would be about $50,000 to $60,000 per patient.”  (A reader has since wrote in and says the Canadian Government pays for this treatment)
   

Actually that cost is more than other stem cell therapies in Costa Rica and China that we have covered in here (both are around $25-30,000) and do NOT use chemo.

So for those people who say that stem cell therapy overseas is very expensive– just look at Canada, or for that matter, look at Dr. Richard Burt’s multiple sclerosis study at Northwestern University in Chicago.  The cost for one multiple sclerosis patient is $90,000

I’m directing  this at critics who always point out that overseas stem cell therapies are expensive and dangerous rather than pointing out the “arrogance” of Dr. Freedman, who as far as I can tell is truly helping Multiple Sclerosis patients although he probably shouldn’t be opening his mouth about other stem cell treatments.

Stem Cell Treatment By The People, For The People

And yes, all of  these stem cell treatments in Canada, USA, Costa Rica, and China are “unproven” in the eyes of the medical world and the New England Journal of Medicine, although they all are proven in the eyes of the patients who receive the Adult Stem Cells whether they are in the form of umbilical cord stem cells (China), mixture of stem cells from the patient’s fat and cord blood stem cells(Costa Rica) and/or Adult Stem Cells given in the form of a stem cell transplant after chemotherapy (Canada, USA).   They all seem to work most of the time FOR THE PATIENTS NOW and that is what is important. Making Multiple Sclerosis patients wait for 10 years or so for the endless cycle of clinical trials in the US and Canada to end just so their doctors can see the words “proven” in a study is a travesty.

The Emergence of the Internet and Self Directed Healthcare

We can ask Jason Upshaw and friends about stem cell therapy in Costa Rica. Or, we can ask Betty Helm about how stem cell therapy in China worked for her MS. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, patients now have a bigger say and more access to information than ever before.

Dr. William Davis at the Heart Scan Blog has a great post on how health care is changing. Much like stockbrokers have disappeared due to online companies like E-trade and Ameritrade, patients can now take a more self directed approach to their health thanks to the internet.

original post by Don Margolis

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Complications and unanticipated side-effects that have slowed the progression of stem cell studies from the lab to the clinic could soon change, researchers say.
For a decade, stem cells have tantalized scientists and patients with their promise to regenerate damaged tissues and offer treatments for incurable diseases.

No one hears, however, about the individuals who died due to complications of surgery, said Dr. Hans Keirstead, a Canadian researcher who made a paralyzed rat walk back in 2004 by injecting its spinal cord with cells derived from human embryonic stem cells.
Keirstead’s lab at the University of California-Irvine just received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to conduct the same experiment in 10 people with recent spinal cord injuries.

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Scientists at the Ottawa Health Research Institute have been awarded $2.4 million to develop stem-cell therapies that could reverse blindness.
The five-year grant is to help researchers develop better methods for turning stem cells, harvested from human embryos and from patients themselves, into different kinds of eye cells.

If successful, this form of stem-cell therapy would take medicine one more step toward rebuilding the body’s sick and damaged parts.
The treatment could benefit more than one million Canadians affected by degenerative eye diseases.

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