Experimental stem cell treatment key in Gordie Howes dramatic improvement

Gordie Howe has responded so well to stem cell treatment that his son Marty wants the Hockey Hall of Famer to undergo the procedure again.

Gordie suffered two strokes late last year and had maybe a month to live, Marty said, when his family took the 86-year-old to Mexico in December for the treatment.

Gordie Howe can walk again, his speech is improving and hes gained weight that he lost, according to his son.

He is doing so much better, Marty said Tuesday in Calgary. Its a joy to have him with us still.

Hopefully, in my mind, were going to have another treatment of this probably within two months.

Im actually hoping if he keeps doing what hes doing hell be able to travel again and maybe get to five or six events a year so people can see him another time.

Gordie Howe, known as Mr. Hockey, holds NHL records for most games played (1,767) and seasons played (26). He won the Stanley Cup four times as a Detroit Red Wing and also played for the Hartford Whalers.

His 801 career goals rank second only to Wayne Gretzkys 894.

Gordie Howe and Gretzky are scheduled to appear Feb. 6 in Saskatoon at a dinner, which Marty said will be a trial run on how his father responds to travel.

Marty Howe was in Calgary alongside NHL alumni Darryl Sittler, Marty McSorley and Lanny McDonald to promote a pro-am hockey tournament in Gordies name that raises money for Alzheimers and dementia research.

Read more here:
Experimental stem cell treatment key in Gordie Howes dramatic improvement

Stem Cells Could Treat Hair Loss

Got too much scalp? A new way to treat hair loss that doesnt involve solutions, creams or hocus-pocus could be on the way.

Scientists at the Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute have developed a stem cell method that initiates human hair growth.

Stem Cell Treatment Cures Blindness

Stem cells are the baseline, progenitor cells of all cells in our body. Using a genetic technique, Alexey Terskikh, an associate professor at the institute, and his colleagues coaxed stem cells to become dermal papilla cells.

These cells regulate the formation and growth cycle of hair follicles.

When transplanted into lab mice, the dermal papilla cells promoted the growth of hair.

Stem Cells Grow Beating Heart

Our next step is to transplant human dermal papilla cells derived from human pluripotent stem cells back into human subjects, said Terskikh. We are currently seeking partnerships to implement this final step.

Snake-oil salesmen need not apply.

via Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute

Read more here:
Stem Cells Could Treat Hair Loss

Gordie Howes health improved dramatically after stem cell treatment

CALGARY They call it the miracle of stem cells and it was nothing less than a miracle says Marty Howe about his dad Gordies recovery.

Ata press conference Tuesday in Calgary for the Gordie Howe C.A.R.E.S annual hockey Pro-AM, Marty Howe talked about how the stem cell treatment saved Gordie Howes life after suffering two strokes.

He probably had a month to live the way he was going, he was deteriorating pretty fast. To have him now back and be able to relate to everybody really helps, Marty Howe said.

The Howe family remains positive and believes Gordie might be able to travel again and attend events soon. Marty Howe said his dad is already planning to attend an event in Saskatoon next month.

He can walk, hes got a sense of freedom now. He can play with the grand kids. He still needs to work with his speech, he cant sign yet but hopefully in the future he will be able to, Howe said.

Its a joy to have him with us still. Its nothing more of a gift. Hes down in Texas with my sister and we have caregivers that have been coming in for the past two and a half years too.

Gordie Howe has aform of dementia and the 86-year-old suffered hismost recent stroke just before Christmas last year due to dehydration.

A group of doctors, who happened to be named Howe, contacted the family and told them about a stem cell treatment they could offer for Gordie Howe. So the family went down to Mexico to give it a try.

Gordies health improved dramatically. Soon after, hewas able to walk and speak again. The family says Gordie plans to do asecond treatment in two months.

Known as Mr. Hockey, Howe was the NHLs Most Valuable Player six times. He played on four Stanley Cup championship teams in Detroit during a 25-year stint that began in 1946. The league scoring records he set stood until Wayne Gretzky broke them.

View original post here:
Gordie Howes health improved dramatically after stem cell treatment

Keeping the Kraken asleep

IMAGE:CDK6 is needed for leukemic stem cell activation (left). When CDK6 is absent, the LSC remains in a quiescent state and leukemia formation is prohibited (right). view more

Credit: Angelika Berger / Vetmeduni Vienna

Despite enormous progress in cancer therapy, many patients still relapse because their treatment addresses the symptoms of the disease rather than the cause, the so-called stem cells. Work in the group of Veronika Sexl at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna has given a tantalizing clue to a solution. In the current issue of Blood, the scientists report that the cell-cycle kinase CDK6 is required for activation of the stem cells responsible for causing leukemia.

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) are normally inactive, i.e. quiescent. When new blood cells are needed, for example to replace blood that has been lost, HSCs start to multiply and develop into mature blood cells. If the process is initiated at an inappropriate time, hematopoietic diseases such as leukemia may result and leukemic stem cells may develop. These represent a major challenge to leukemia therapy: they are quiescent and thus protected from elimination by the immune system and from treatment such as chemotherapy. Leukemic stem cells frequently cause relapse in cancer patients, often years or even decades after an apparently successful treatment.

Working with stem cells isolated from mice, Ruth Scheicher and colleagues at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna have investigated possible differences between leukemic stem cells and the healthy stem cells in the body. They looked in particular at the function of the CDK6 protein, which is known to be involved in controlling the cell cycle. Surprisingly, CDK6 was also found to regulate the activation of hematopoietic and leukemic stem cells, which it does by inhibiting the transcription factor Egr1. Upon loss of CDK6, Egr1 becomes active and prevents stem cells from dividing. In a further twist to the tale, the mechanism operates only when hematopoietic stem cells are stressed, e.g. in leukemia, and not in the normal physiological situation.

Scheicher is quick to note the significance of her finding. "CDK6 is absolutely necessary for leukemic stem cells to induce disease but plays no part in normal hematopoiesis. We thus have a novel opportunity to target leukemia at its origin. Inhibiting CDK6 should attack leukemic stem cells while leaving healthy HSCs unaffected".

###

Service: The article 'CDK6 as a key regulator of hematopoietic and leukemic stem cell activation' by Scheicher R, Hoelbl-Kovacic A, Bellutti F, Tigan AS, Prchal-Murphy M, Heller G, Schneckenleithner C, Salazar-Roa M, Zchbauer-Mller S, Zuber J, Malumbres M, Kollmann K and Sexl V. was published in the journal Blood. http://www.bloodjournal.org/content/125/1/90.long?sso-checked=true

About the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna

The University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna in Austria is one of the leading academic and research institutions in the field of Veterinary Sciences in Europe. About 1,300 employees and 2,300 students work on the campus in the north of Vienna which also houses five university clinics and various research sites. Outside of Vienna the university operates Teaching and Research Farms. http://www.vetmeduni.ac.at

See the article here:
Keeping the Kraken asleep

Sask. man off to Malaysia for stem cell treatment

A 28-year-old North Battleford man plans to head to Malaysia next month for a stem cell treatment he hopes will cure his debilitating liver disease.

Kyle Allan is able to pay for the trip thanks to the success of a gofundme.com campaign, which rocketed past its $25,000 goal in just one week.

As of Monday, he'd raised $61,425.

"It was mind blowing," Allan said.

His girlfriend, Valerie Blais, who set up the campaign, had no idea it would do so well and had even expected to do additional fundraising.

"It's completely overwhelming. It shows so much love and support from people in our lives and the community," she said.

When Allan was about three years old, he repeatedly contracted pneumonia and other infections, and was diagnosed with Common Variable Immunodefiency, for which no cure has been identified.

He previously received an IV treatment once a month, which has now increased to once per day. Growing up, he was often tired and didn't have as much energy as other children, but as he got into his teens he improved.

"I was pretty much a normal kid," he said.

He became a welder and worked in Fort McMurray, then got his journeyman qualifications at SIAST. He was about to head back north when, on Aug. 18, 2008, he couldn't get out of bed.

See the rest here:
Sask. man off to Malaysia for stem cell treatment

Using stem cells to grow new hair

In a new study from Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham), researchers have used human pluripotent stem cells to generate new hair. The study represents the first step toward the development of a cell-based treatment for people with hair loss. In the United States alone, more than 40 million men and 21 million women are affected by hair loss. The research was published online in PLOS One yesterday.

"We have developed a method using human pluripotent stem cells to create new cells capable of initiating human hair growth. The method is a marked improvement over current methods that rely on transplanting existing hair follicles from one part of the head to another," said Alexey Terskikh, Ph.D., associate professor in the Development, Aging, and Regeneration Program at Sanford-Burnham. "Our stem cell method provides an unlimited source of cells from the patient for transplantation and isn't limited by the availability of existing hair follicles."

The research team developed a protocol that coaxed human pluripotent stem cells to become dermal papilla cells. They are a unique population of cells that regulate hair-follicle formation and growth cycle. Human dermal papilla cells on their own are not suitable for hair transplants because they cannot be obtained in necessary amounts and rapidly lose their ability to induce hair-follicle formation in culture.

"In adults, dermal papilla cells cannot be readily amplified outside of the body and they quickly lose their hair-inducing properties," said Terskikh. "We developed a protocol to drive human pluripotent stem cells to differentiate into dermal papilla cells and confirmed their ability to induce hair growth when transplanted into mice."

"Our next step is to transplant human dermal papilla cells derived from human pluripotent stem cells back into human subjects," said Terskikh. "We are currently seeking partnerships to implement this final step."

Story Source:

The above story is based on materials provided by Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

See original here:
Using stem cells to grow new hair

Stamina doctor Davide Vannoni in 22-month plea bargain

Psychologist on trial for criminal association, fraud

(ANSA) - Turin, January 27 - A psychologist who developed the now-banned Stamina stem-cell treatment for terminal nerve disease patients entered a formal request for a plea bargain in a trial against him during a preliminary hearing on Tuesday. Davide Vannoni requested a plea deal of one year and 10 months. In Italy, custodial sentences of under three years are usually suspended. Prosecutor Raffaele Guariniello backed the request, saying the withdrawal by Vannoni of an appeal to the Lazio administrative court against a provision rejecting the controversial therapy eliminated all doubt concerning the possible reiteration of the crime. Vannoni is on trial with 13 others on charges including aggravated criminal association with intent to commit fraud in connection with the therapy, which he used on terminally ill degenerative nerve disease patients. The health ministry last November decreed the end of experimentation with the controversial Stamina treatment, which supporters say could help cure degenerative nerve diseases but which experts say lacks a scientific basis. The credibility of the Stamina treatment, which involves extracting bone-marrow stem cells from a patient, supposedly turning them into neurons by exposing them to retinoic acid for two hours, and injecting them back into the patient, has long been suspect. The health ministry in late 2013 ruled that the Stamina Foundation would no longer be allowed to test the treatment on humans, and it was stripped of its non-profit status. A panel of government-appointed experts said last year it found the therapy seriously lacking in both premise and practice. Their report cited "serious imperfections and omissions in the Stamina protocol, including conceptual errors and an apparent ignorance of stem-cell biology". Vannoni told Nature magazine in a 2013 interview that he developed the therapy after receiving what he said was stem-cell treatment for a virus-induced facial paralysis in Russia in 2004.

Read the rest here:
Stamina doctor Davide Vannoni in 22-month plea bargain