Stem Cell Therapy for Myocardial Infarction Therapy

No Gravatar

The Framingham health study indicates that about 1 in 5 (both men and women) persons will develop heart failure over the course of their lives. Once there is a myocardial infarction (MI, “heart attack”), current therapy employs drug therapy, but that does not treat the underlying cause(s).  There is a loss of heart tissue that requires regeneration and repair.

Dr. B.E. Strauer and colleagues(Heinrich-Heine University in Dusseldorf), have been employing stem cell therapy to address that (regeneration and repair) issue.  However, instead of using embryo-based stem cell cultures, their studies have taken cells from the patient’s own bone marrow (pelvic region) and converted them to cardiomyocytes (myocardial cells).  They (Strauer and Kornowski) had published previously (2003) that bone marrow had both

Diseases and conditions where stem cell treatm...

Image via Wikipedia

hematopoietic and mesenchymal stem cells; both of which could contribute to heart muscle repair.

At the recent (2010) European Society of Cardiology Congress (and published in the European Journal of Heart Failure), a study of 391 patients was presented.  These patients (all exhibiting ischemic cardiomyopathy) had experienced MI between three and eight years previously.  About ½ (191) underwent stem cell treatment; the others were unwilling to participate in the stem cell injections (and, therefore, served as a control for the experiment).  Follow-up examinations occurred at 3 and 12 months, as well as five (5) years post therapy.

The benefits from the stem cells were seen as early as three months and continued for the five year study period. There seems to be a notable decrease in mortality- the control group (untreated) had a mortality of 3.68% per year (32 patient deaths); the treated group had a mortality of some 0.75% per year (7 patient deaths).  There also was an increased ejection fraction (amount of blood pumped out of the ventricles with each heart beat) after 5 years post stem cell treatment (29.4% v 36.8%), as opposed to decreased levels with the controls (36.1 v. 32.3%).

It may be possible that the method of stem-cell administration was as critical to the results as the injection of the stem cells themselves.  Once the stem cells were delivered to the infarcted area (via a balloon catheter), the catheter was inflated to preclude backflow of cells and extend the contact period for the cells; the inflation of the balloon provided an ischemic condition that probably enhanced cell uptake by the heart.

Share this:
Share this page via Email Share this page via Stumble Upon Share this page via Digg this Share this page via Facebook Share this page via Twitter
Share

36 thoughts on “Stem Cell Therapy for Myocardial Infarction Therapy”

  1. Pingback: Stem Cell Therapy for Myocardial Infarction Therapy | Cerebrations … edu university
  2. Pingback: Press Release | cord blood banking
  3. Good day, Fantastic site, exactly where did you occur up of the info in this summation? Im glad I discovered it though, I will be checking back soon to see what other articles you have.

  4. Super-Duper website! I am loving it!! Will come back once more – taking you feeds also, Thanks.

  5. I mistyped this web site and thankfully I found it again. presently am at my university I additional this to favorites in order that I can re-read it later regards

    1. Marcus Amoa I am so glad you found me again. You can find us at cerebrations.biz, cerebrations.net, or via adjuvancy.com. Have a great day and thanks for your comment. RAAckerman

  6. Do you mind if I quote a few of your articles as long as I provide credit and sources back to your weblog? My website is in the exact same niche as yours and my users would truly benefit from a lot of the information you present here. Please let me know if this ok with you. Regards!

  7. Pingback: My Homepage
  8. Pingback: Homepage
  9. Pingback: All about Backlinks
  10. Pingback: trolikter
  11. Pingback: Free Image Hosting
  12. Pingback: gulertinto
  13. Pingback: justbeenpaid
  14. Pingback: link
  15. Pingback: justbeenpaid
  16. Pingback: remedies for treatment
  17. Pingback: Anonymous
  18. Pingback: legal shield
  19. Pingback: dofollow seo social bookmarks site
  20. Pingback: go bag contents
  21. Pingback: low vitamin d
  22. Pingback: fish oil benefits
  23. Pingback: emergency to go bag
  24. Pingback: gurtoertil

Comments are closed.