Stem cell therapy successfully treats heart attack in animals

[RedEarth]

Two patients enrolled in Phase I clinical trials at Hopkins - Final results of a study conducted at Johns Hopkins show that stem cell therapy can be used effectively to treat heart attacks, or myocardial infarction, in pigs. In just two months, stem cells harvested from another pig's bone marrow and injected into the animal's damaged heart restored heart function and repaired damaged heart muscle by 50 percent to 75 percent.

The Hopkins findings, first presented last fall at the 2004 Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association, are to be published in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences online the week of July 25.

Two patients have already been enrolled at Hopkins in a Phase I clinical trial, which is designed to test the safety of injecting adult stem cells at varying doses in patients who have recently suffered a heart attack. In total, 48 patients will participate in this study, which is happening at several sites across the country. Results are not expected until mid-2006.

"Ultimately, the goal is to develop a widely applicable treatment to repair and reverse the damage done to heart muscle that has been infarcted, or destroyed, after losing its blood supply," says cardiologist Joshua Hare, M.D., professor of medicine at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and its Heart Institute, and senior author of the study and lead trial investigator.

"There is reason for optimism about these findings, possibly leading to a first-ever cure for heart attack in humans," he says. "If a treatment can be found for the damage done by a heart attack to heart muscle, then there is the potential to forestall the serious complications that traditionally result from a heart attack, including disturbances of heart rhythm that can lead to sudden cardiac death, and decreased muscle pumping function that can lead to congestive heart failure."

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=28053

[donco6]

1. Can it repair stupidity?

Maybe this could get Bush to change his mind!

[DanCa]

5. Bushco still thinks cameras steal souls (nt)

[tanyev]

2. Watch the majority of the moral objections crowd

suddenly melt away.

[Bridget Burke]

3. Good news, but not political.

There are many kinds of stem cells; these were harvested from bone marrow.

They were not fetal stem cells.

[DanCa]

4. You know theres so much potentional with stem cell therapy

I don't know why we need to limit ourselves with either/or embryonic or adult stem cells.

[Bridget Burke]

7. Yes, further research is definitely needed.

How can each type of stem cell be used? If fetal stem cells can truly do things the others can't, we need the data.

Actually, there is a political aspect to the subject. We can't depend on the pharmaceutical companies to fund all the research. But our government has other ways to spend our tax dollars.

[Patty Diana]

6. This Stem Cell Issue doesn't sit well with Big Pharma or the AMA.

They figure, they both will become obsolete. And God forbid what will happen when the hospitals are empty, waiting rooms aren't jammed and nobody needs those overpriced drugs anymore. If we had Universal Healthcare everyone would demand all kinds of stem cell research.

[DanCa]

8. Welcome to DU Patty

And no truer post has been written.

[Vinca]

9. What an exciting and promising discovery! Too bad

45 million of us lack health insurance and couldn't afford the treatment.

[jsamuel]

10. actually this sounds like it would be REALLY cheap

it just takes cells from bone marrow of one "person" (a donor) and injects the stem cells into the heart. If the donor is just any organ donor then the marrow wouldn't be to hard to find if there are no real matching requirements like there are for other organs.

[ret5hd]

11. i believe you could harvest the bone marrow stem cells from...

the patient himself, much as you would harvest bone marrow ...i could be wrong though.

[PatsFan2004]

12. Korea has done a lot of umbilical stem cell research with positive

results. It seems that most of the newsworthy medical treatments have been with non-fetal tissue stem cells even though scientists believe that embryonic stem cells hold more potential.

[Eurobabe]

13. Is Cheney one of the TWO subjects?

God, I hope not...