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NCERX Special Report: Stem Cells, Part 3, Oct 2003 30th September 2003
Everyone's heard by now of the furor that surrounds stem cell research. But do you have to be a scientist to understand the issues? In this first of three articles about stem cell research, you will learn the basics about stem cells: what they are, and why they're important.
Stem Cell Research: The Good News!
Stem cell research continues to be controversial because it sometimes involves the harvesting of embryonic cells. Also, its relationship to cloning makes it a very touchy subject indeed.
In the meantime, scientists involved in stem cell research are making progress in almost all areas of medicine that involve treatment or interventions at the cellular level.
The daily news is filled with success stories and lives saved as a result of stem cell transplants. Read on to look at examples of modern miracles brought to us by stem cell experiments . . .
Bone Grafts
Until now, obtaining a bone graft involved what medical professionals call a "highly morbid" method of treatment: using a chisel to dig bone and marrow from the patient's hip.
A company called Aastrom Biosciences Inc. has recently received approval from the FDA to run clinical trials on an alternative that instead uses a "bone tissue repair stem cell product." Less pain, more gain.
Avoiding Heart Transplants
In Brazil, four seriously ill heart patients awaiting heart transplants were treated with stem cells harvested from their own bone marrow.
The cells were injected into the heart's main pumping chamber, the left ventricle. Eventually, the damaged heart muscle began to repair itself with the growth of these news cells, and the patients no longer needed a new heart.
Lung Tissue Regeneration
The American medical community spends more than $20 billion each year on treating lung diseases, such as cystic fibrosis.
Scientists have "coaxed" embryonic stem cells into growing in lungs to repair damage. They are hoping that adult stem cells from blood and bone marrow may have equally effective results. Patients with emphysema and cystic fibrosis will benefit from the results of this research.
Lou Gehrig's Disease
More than 30,000 Americans suffer from Lou Gehrig's Disease, a paralyzing disease that originates in the spine and causes muscle weakness and atrophy. Half of all patients die within 18 months of diagnosis.
Scientists have successfully used gene therapy to prolong the lives of lab animals with the disease. They hope they can duplicate their results in humans.
Infertility
Some scientists predict that stem cell research advances will make it possible to grow artificial eggs and sperm. Recently, research on mice has been successful in producing these specialized sex cells from stem cells. While it may take a decade or more before this research progresses to humans, this research gives hope to many infertile couples.
More Surprises to Come
These days, finding an area of medicine that has not been touched by the potential of stem cell research is difficult. While the complex ethical issues remain, much animal research is being conducted to bypass the problem of involving cells recovered from embryos.
Biologists in China have recently reprogrammed stem cells from human adults by fusing them with rabbit eggs devoid of their genetic material; a type of cloning. They hope these cells will behave in the way the embryonic stem cells would, regenerating into any type of cell needed to repair damaged or aging human cells.
Breaking News: On Monday, September 29, researchers at the University of Wisconsin's WiCell Institute, the University of Washington Seattle and the associated Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and the University of Michigan Medical School were the beneficiaries of a grant from the National Institutes of Health. These research centers will share $6.3 million over the next three years to continue work on their stores of embryonic stem cells. By studying these cells, the researchers hope to determine how they can take any other stem cell and make it "perform the same magic" as an embryonic stem cell.
This Special Report is brought to you courtesy of NCERX LLC, an independent information publisher dedicated to providing useful, timely, relevant, and easily understood information on a wide range of healthcare topics.
Stem Cell Research: The Controversy (part two)
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