Adult Stem Cell Treatments Better Than Dying

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Here is a PR Newswire release about Thailand’s stem cell company, Theravitae, using adult stem cells in heart disease patients – a better alternative, they say, to death or transplant.

More stem cell news:

Amyloidosis Patients who received stem cell transplants have been found to be surviving long term:

The findings appear pre-published in the first edition of Blood. BUMC was the first to begin using this treatment in 1994 and is the only center to publish these long-term outcome results.

AL amyloidosis occurs when plasma cells in bone marrow produce proteins that misfold and deposit in tissues, leading to organ failure and death. Between 1,200 and 3,200 new cases are reported each year in the United States, although researchers believe the disease is highly underdiagnosed.

The researchers reviewed the records of 80 patients who received high-dose chemotherapy and blood stem cell transplantation from July 1994 through July 1997. The median survival for all 80 patients was 57 months. Eighteen of these patients, (23 percent) are still alive today, 10 or more years after undergoing the treatment. By comparison, only two percent of patients treated with oral melphalan and prednisone have survived more than 10 years.


India sees its first successful case of unrelated umbilical cord blood transplantation.

The patient, an eight year old boy, lost a brother to a rare blood disease years earlier. When Howard was also diagnosed with Fanconi anemia last year his mother was determined not to lose another son. So they went ahead with the unrelated transplantation and, so far, doctors are satisfied with the results. Howard has been back home to Uganda.

You just gotta love all these happy, successful, ethically sound stem cell stories. These success stories also point out the major difference between the campaign for ASC research vs. ESC research. On the one hand you have those touting ESC research saying look at this person dying from cancer, here see the poor paraplegic who will never walk again, don’t you want to give them “hope” and “promise.” On the other hand ACS supporters say, look at this person no longer dying from heart disease, see how this paraplegic is has gained feeling and movement and is able to stand and walk for the first time in years, don’t you want to help treat more people like them? One side is full of emotion and heart break, while the other offers healing and joy.

See:
Adult Stem Cell Research archive

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