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Stem cell research is on the rise, giving hope to patients and providing treatment for many diseases and disorders. While stem cell treatments are a fairly new science, they can have life-saving effects.

Stem cell treatments consist of removing healthy regenerative cells from the patient and transplanting them into the affected area. This treatment helps repair and reverse a variety of conditions and diseases.

Regenerative cells can be harvested from the patient's bone marrow, fat or peripheral blood. This is done to eliminate the risk of cell rejection in the patient.

Typically, four to six treatments are administered depending on how the condition reacts to the stem cell treatment. Treatments are given over a period of seven to 12 days.

Stem cell treatments are effective at treating autoimmune diseases, cerebral palsy, degenerative joint disease, multiple sclerosis, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, spinal injuries and type 2 diabetes. It is thought that in the future, stem cell treatment can be used to treat Alzheimer's disease.

Stem cell therapy can reduce pain and discomfort; it can help patients suffering from arthritis regain mobility. In serious cases, such as cerebral palsy and multiple sclerosis, stem cell treatments can be life-saving.

Because stem cell treatment is a new science, little is known about its long term effects. According to Cell Medicine, no side effects have been reported by patients other than pain at the injection site.

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Stem Cell Treatment Stem Cell Therapy Stem Cell …

Stem Cell Therapy

Stem cell treatment and stem cell therapy may be considered controversial and are, perhaps, viewed as akin to science fiction by some people. However, stem cell treatments have been used regularly in veterinary practice since 2003 for the repair of bone and tissue damage, and have a wealth of research highlighting their efficacy in both humans and other animals. Stem cells are found in plentiful supply in embryonic tissue, but are also found in adult tissues. These cells have the ability to self-renew, giving rise to countless generations of new cells with varying abilities to differentiate into specific cell types. By introducing stem cells into an area of damage or pathology, the body can be encouraged to repair and renew regardless of how old the trauma is. Stem cells also show application for inhibiting the death of cells (apoptosis) through disease, making them candidates for use in treating degenerative illnesses such as Lou Gehrigs disease, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinsons disease and Alzheimers.

Stem cells from embryos are considered more flexible in terms of their ability to become either new liver cells, new neurons, new skin cells, and so on, whereas adult stem cells tend to be more restricted to the tissue type from which they were taken. New research is showing that this might not necessarily have to remain the case however, with the plasticity of adult stem cells now under investigation. Stem cell use carries little risk of the resulting tissues being rejected, it appears safe, efficient, and almost endless in its possibilities for application.

Potential Stem Cell Treatments

Conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, spinal cord injury, and cancer, among others, are considered possible candidates for stem cell treatment. Cures for some of these diseases could be closer than previously thought with clinical trials already showing impressive results where stem cells have been used in cases thought intractable. The rapid rate of progression in research and clinical use means that some of the controversial issues, such as the use of embryos as a source of stem cells, have been overcome, with governments around the globe subtly altering their legal policies in order to accommodate new scientific advances. In the US, Bill Clinton was the first president to have to consider the legal issues surrounding stem cells, and subsequent presidents have been forced to readdress the issues time and again in line with medical discoveries. Worldwide, governments have remained generally cautious over the use of this technology but are gradually improving funding access, whilst keeping an eye on the ethics of stem cell treatment, in order to explore the tremendous benefits that appear possible. The credibility of research remains a concern, with some stem cell studies discredited by ethics committees after initial general acceptance of their veracity.

Stem cells may be garnered from living adult donors and, indeed, already are in the case of bone marrow transplants. More usually they are taken from discarded embryos leftover after IVF treatment, or from the placenta after birth. Previously the removal of stem cells resulted in the destruction of these embryos, but now it is possible for scientists to remove the stem cells without this occurring. This development negates some of the criticism faced by the technology from religious groups and ethical bodies over the sanctity of life and the attribution of sentience and autonomy to embryos, gametes, and the foetus. Clearly, some debate remains about these issues in relation to stem cell research, but recent improvements in methodology may remove the need for these considerations completely. Clinicians have demonstrated the possibility of taking adult stem cells and seemingly teaching them to become cells of a different type to their site of removal, effectively returning them to a similar state to that of the embryonic stem cell. Whilst stem cells from embryos remain more reliable and more economical to work with, the use of adult tissue-derived stem cells could revolutionize the research in this field.

As well as stem cell use in pathology and disease, there are also applications in personal aesthetics such as the regeneration of hair follicles and an end to baldness through stem cell treatment. Stem cells are also considered useful in regenerating the skin after injury, without the scarring usually associated with repair. There are reports of paralyzed patients becoming mobile after years in a wheelchair through the use of stem cells injected into the spinal cord, and the rapid disappearance of tumors in brain tissue after stem cells were injected.

Stem cell treatment provides an exciting possibility to change the face of modern medicine, alleviating pain and suffering, and improving the prognosis for millions withe diseases previously thought incurable.

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Stem Cell Of America | Breakthrough Stem Cell Treatment

Treatment

The Stem Cell treatment performed at our clinics is a painless medical procedure where Stem Cells (cellular building blocks) are usually administered intravenously and subcutaneously (under the skin). The whole procedure takes approximately one hour and has no known negative side effects.*

Following the treatment, the Fetal Stem Cells will travel throughout the body, detecting damaged cells and tissue and attempts to restore them. The Fetal Stem Cells can also stimulate existing normal cells and tissues to operate at a higher level of function, boosting the bodys own repair mechanisms to aid in the healing process. These highly adaptive cells then remain in the body, continually locating and repairing any damage they encounter.

As with any medical treatment, safety should be of the highest priority. The Stem Cells used in our treatment undergo extensive screening for possible infection and impurities. Utilizing tests more sophisticated than those regularly used in the United States for Stem Cell research and transplant. Our testing process ensures we use only the healthiest cells to enable the safest and most effective Fetal Stem Cell treatment possible. And, unlike other types of Stem Cells, there is no danger of the bodys rejection of Fetal Stem Cells due to the fact they have no antigenicity (cellular fingerprint). This unique quality eliminates the need for drugs used to suppress the immune system, which can leave a patient exposed to serious infections.

With over 2000 patients treated, Stem Cell Of America has achieved positive results with a wide variety of illnesses, conditions and injuries. Often, in cases where the diseases continued to worsen, our patients have reported substantial improvements following the Stem Cell treatment.

Patients have experienced favorable developments such as reduction or elimination of pain, increased strength and mobility, improved cognitive function, higher tolerance for chemotherapy, and quicker healing and recovery.

To view follow up letters from patients, please visit the patient experiences page on our website.

Like all medical treatments and procedures, results may significantly vary and positive results may not always be achieved.

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Stem Cell Of America | Breakthrough Stem Cell Treatment

Stem cell agency's grants to UCLA help set stage for revolutionary medicine

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

29-Jan-2014

Contact: Shaun Mason smason@mednet.ucla.edu 310-206-2805 University of California - Los Angeles

Scientists from UCLA's Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research were today awarded grants totaling more than $3.5 million by California's stem cell agency for their ongoing efforts to advance revolutionary stem cell science in medicine.

Recipients of the awards from the California Institute of Renerative Medicine (CIRM) included Lili Yang ($614,400), who researches how stem cells become rare immune cells; Denis Evseenko ($1,146,468), who is studying the biological niche in which stem cells grow into cartilage; Thomas Otis and Bennet Novitch ($1,148,758), who are using new techniques to study communication between nerve and muscle cells in spinal muscular atrophy; and Samantha Butler ($598,367), who is investigating the molecular elements that drive stem cells to become the neurons in charge of our sense of touch.

"These basic biology grants form the foundation of the revolutionary advances we are seeing in stem cell science," said Dr. Owen Witte, professor and director of the Broad Stem Cell Research Center. "Every cellular therapy that reaches patients must begin in the laboratory with ideas and experiments that will lead us to revolutionize medicine and ultimately improve human life. That makes these awards invaluable to our research effort."

The awards are part of CIRM's Basic Biology V grant program, which fosters cutting-edge research on significant unresolved issues in human stem cell biology, with a focus on unravelling the key mechanisms that determine how stem cells decide which cells they will become. By learning how such mechanisms work, scientists can develop therapies that drive stem cells to regenerate or replace damaged or diseased tissue.

Lili Yang: Tracking special immune cells

The various cells that make up human blood all arise from hematopoietic stem cells. These include special white blood cells called T cells, the "foot soldiers" of the immune system that attack bacteria, viruses and other disease-causing invaders. Among these T cells is a smaller group, a kind of "special forces" unit known as invariant natural killer T cells, or iNKT cells, which have a remarkable capacity to mount immediate and powerful responses to disease when activated and are believed to be important to the immune system's regulation of infections, allergies, cancer and autoimmune diseases such as Type I diabetes and multiple sclerosis.

The iNKT cells develop in small numbers in the blood generally accounting for less than 1 percent of blood cells but can differ greatly in numbers among individuals. Very little is known about how blood stem cells produce iNKT cells.

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Stem cell agency's grants to UCLA help set stage for revolutionary medicine

Donor drive for Coventry youngster Rhiane

A LITTLE girl from Coventry is seriously ill and needs the publics help in finding a matching blood stem cell donor.

Rhiane Francois, 7, was sadly diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia last September and has undergone several rounds of chemotherapy.

Once her chemotherapy treatment has finished, she is likely to need a stem cell donation to save her life.

For many blood cancer patients a blood stem cell donation is their only chance of survival, but only half of the people diagnosed in the UK find a matching donor.

Rhiane, her family and friends are working with Delete Blood Cancer UK to encourage people to register as potential stem cell donors and are holding an event at the Belgrade Theatre this Saturday to tell people about becoming a donor and registering those who are interested in joining the registry.

The event will take place from 10am-4pm. Anyone in good general health between the ages of 18-55 can register as a potential stem cell donor and pre-registration is possible from the age of 17.

When the family were told about Rhiane being diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia, obviously we had mixed emotions, said Natalie Francois, Rhianes aunt.

You don't expect a child to have such an illness, but seeing just how positive Rhiane has continued to be, inspired us to do something positive that would not just potentially save Rhiane but also one of the many other patients in need of a stem cell donation.

Rhiane keeps telling the family that she is fighting this poorly bug.

We are working with Delete Blood Cancer UK in order to encourage as many people from our local communities to register to be on standby to donate some stem cells. Its such a simple process that could save a life.

Continued here:
Donor drive for Coventry youngster Rhiane

New stem cell may aid medicine

Mouse cells exposed to an acidic environment turned into embryonic-like "STAP" cells. These were used to generate an entire fetus.

A simple lab treatment can turn ordinary cells from mice into a new kind of stem cell, according to a surprising study that hints at a new way to grow tissue for treating illnesses like diabetes and Parkinsons disease.

Researchers in Boston and Japan exposed spleen cells from newborn mice to an acidic environment. In lab tests, that made the cells act like embryonic stem cells, showing enough versatility to produce the tissues of a mouse embryo, for example.

Cells from skin, muscle, fat and other tissue of newborn mice went through the same change, which could be triggered by exposing cells to any of a variety of stressful situations, researchers said.

Its very simple to do. I think you could do this actually in a college lab, said Dr. Charles Vacanti of Brigham and Womens Hospital in Boston, an author of two papers published online Wednesday by the journal Nature. They can be found here and here.

If it works in humans, the method could improve upon an existing method of generating artificial embryonic stem cells, called induced pluripotent stem cells. These IPS cells can be made from patients, then turned into the needed cells, reducing the possibility of transplant rejection. Pluripotent is a term for cells that act like embryonic stem cells, which can turn into nearly any tissue of the body, except for placental tissues.

In San Diego, scientists led by The Scripps Research Institutes Jeanne Loring propose to treat Parkinsons disease patients with brain cells generated from their own IPS cells. Because these cells arent taken from human embryos, they dont raise the ethical concerns some have with using embryonic stem cells.

However induced pluripotent stem cells are made by reprogramming ordinary cells with added genes or chemicals, which raises concerns about safety. The new method, in contrast, causes the cell to change its own behavior after researchers have applied an external stress. The actual DNA sequence is unaltered, creating a change that is epigenetic, or taking place outside the genome. Researchers dubbed the new cells STAP cells, for stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency.

This is part of a shift in our view of pluripotency, Loring said by email. Eight years ago we thought that cells were stable -- whatever they are, they stay that way. Now, were thinking in terms of how powerful epigenetics is -- that we can change cell fate without changing their DNA.

Loring said it will take years to apply the new method for human therapy.

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New stem cell may aid medicine

Donor bid inspired by Rhiane's fight against 'poorly bug'

Buy photos Rhiane with kickboxing coach Dev Barrett and Specials front man Neville Staple. Picture by Jon Mullis 05.014.015.cov.jm5 (www.buyphotos247.com)

A SERIOUSLY ill girl needs help from the public in finding a matching blood stem cell donor.

Rhiane Francois, from Whitley, was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia last September and has undergone several rounds of chemotherapy, the latest of which started on Monday.

Once her treatment has finished, the seven-year-old is likely to need a stem cell donation to save her life.

For many blood cancer patients a blood stem cell donation is their only chance of survival, but only half of the people diagnosed in the UK find a matching donor.

And Rhiane, her family and friends are working with Delete Blood Cancer UK to encourage people to register as potential stem cell donors.

When the family were told about Rhiane being diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia, obviously we had mixed emotions, said her aunt Natalie Francois.

You don't expect a child to have such an illness, but seeing just how positive Rhiane has continued to be inspired us to do something positive that would not just potentially save Rhiane but also one of the many other patients in need of a stem cell donation.

On Saturday they held an event at the Belgrade Theatre which attracted over 400 visitors to make people aware of Rhiane's condition and create interest in becoming a donor.

Organisers said it was a huge success with similar events also being held in London and Glasgow.

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Donor bid inspired by Rhiane's fight against 'poorly bug'

Acid bath turns cells from any tissue into stem cells

The development of human embryonic stem cells, which have the ability to form any cell in the body, may enable us to repair tissues damaged by injury or disease. Initially, these cells could only be obtained through methods that some deemed ethically unacceptable, but researchers eventually developed a combination of genes that could reprogram most cells into an embryonic-like state. That worked great for studies, but wasn't going to work for medical uses, since one of the genes involved has been associated with cancer.

Researchers have since been focusing on whittling down the requirements needed for getting a cell to behave like a stem cell. Now, researchers have figured out a radically simplified process: expose the cells to acidic conditions, then put them in conditions that stem cells grow well in. After a week, it's possible to direct these cells into a state that's even more flexible than embryonic stem cells.

The catalyst for this work is rather unusual. The researchers were motivated by something that works in plants: expose individual plant cells to acidic conditions, grow them in hormones that normally direct plant development, and you can get a whole plant back out. But we're talking about plants here, which evolved with multicellularity and with specialized tissues in a lineage that's completely separate from that of animals. So there's absolutely no reason to suspect that animal cells would react in a similar way to acid treatmentand a number of reasons to expect they wouldn't.

And yet the researchers went ahead and tried anyway. And, amazingly, it worked.

The treatments weren't especially harshonly a half-hour in a pH of 5.45.8. Afterward, the cells were placed in the same culture medium that stem cells are grown in. Many of the cells died, and the ones that were left didn't proliferate like stem cells do. But, over the course of a week, the surviving cells began to activate the genes that are normally expressed by stem cells. This was initially tried with precursors to blood cells, but it turned out to work with a huge variety of tissues: brain, skin, muscle, fat, bone marrow, lung, and liver (all of them obtained from micethis hasn't been tried with human cells yet).

While these cells didn't divide like stem cells, they did behave like them. Injecting them into embryos showed that they were incorporated into every tissue in the body, meaning they had the potential to form any cell. That suggests they are a distinct class of cell from the other ones we're aware of (the researchers call them STAP cells).

But, if they don't grow in culture, it's hard to use or study them. So, the authors tried various combinations of hormones and growth factors that stem cells like. One combination got some of the STAP cells to grow, after which they behaved very much like embryonic stem cells. But a second combination of growth factors got the cells to contribute to non-embryonic tissues, like the placenta, as well. So, in this sense, they seem to be even more flexible than embryonic stem cells, and seem more akin to one of the first cells formed after fertilization.

The people behind this development have done a tremendous amount of work, so much that it was spread across two papers. Still, like many good results, it raises lots of other questions. Many cells in our bodies get exposed to acidic conditions every daywhy do those manage to stably maintain their identity? A related question is what goes on at a molecular level inside the cell after acid treatment. Understanding that will help us learn more about the stem cell fate itself.

And then there are the practical questions. How close are these STAP cells to an actual embryonic cell, in terms of the state of its DNA and gene expression? And, if there are differences, are they significant enough to prevent these cells from being used in safe and efficient medical treatments?

January 30, 2014. DOI: 10.1038/nature12968, 10.1038/nature12969 (About DOIs).

Here is the original post:
Acid bath turns cells from any tissue into stem cells

Stem cell agency’s grants to UCLA help set stage for revolutionary medicine

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

29-Jan-2014

Contact: Shaun Mason smason@mednet.ucla.edu 310-206-2805 University of California - Los Angeles

Scientists from UCLA's Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research were today awarded grants totaling more than $3.5 million by California's stem cell agency for their ongoing efforts to advance revolutionary stem cell science in medicine.

Recipients of the awards from the California Institute of Renerative Medicine (CIRM) included Lili Yang ($614,400), who researches how stem cells become rare immune cells; Denis Evseenko ($1,146,468), who is studying the biological niche in which stem cells grow into cartilage; Thomas Otis and Bennet Novitch ($1,148,758), who are using new techniques to study communication between nerve and muscle cells in spinal muscular atrophy; and Samantha Butler ($598,367), who is investigating the molecular elements that drive stem cells to become the neurons in charge of our sense of touch.

"These basic biology grants form the foundation of the revolutionary advances we are seeing in stem cell science," said Dr. Owen Witte, professor and director of the Broad Stem Cell Research Center. "Every cellular therapy that reaches patients must begin in the laboratory with ideas and experiments that will lead us to revolutionize medicine and ultimately improve human life. That makes these awards invaluable to our research effort."

The awards are part of CIRM's Basic Biology V grant program, which fosters cutting-edge research on significant unresolved issues in human stem cell biology, with a focus on unravelling the key mechanisms that determine how stem cells decide which cells they will become. By learning how such mechanisms work, scientists can develop therapies that drive stem cells to regenerate or replace damaged or diseased tissue.

Lili Yang: Tracking special immune cells

The various cells that make up human blood all arise from hematopoietic stem cells. These include special white blood cells called T cells, the "foot soldiers" of the immune system that attack bacteria, viruses and other disease-causing invaders. Among these T cells is a smaller group, a kind of "special forces" unit known as invariant natural killer T cells, or iNKT cells, which have a remarkable capacity to mount immediate and powerful responses to disease when activated and are believed to be important to the immune system's regulation of infections, allergies, cancer and autoimmune diseases such as Type I diabetes and multiple sclerosis.

The iNKT cells develop in small numbers in the blood generally accounting for less than 1 percent of blood cells but can differ greatly in numbers among individuals. Very little is known about how blood stem cells produce iNKT cells.

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Stem cell agency's grants to UCLA help set stage for revolutionary medicine

Researchers make stem cell discovery by studying tissue stress and repair

GWEN IFILL: Todays news of a breakthrough in stem cell research captured the attention of scientists around the world.

For years, researchers have been investigating how to get adult stem cells to behave more like embryonic ones, which would allow them to be developed into almost any organ or tissue. The findings announced today involve a simple treatment, immersing adult mouse cells in a mild acid bath. As seen here, mouse embryos were grown with beating heart cells derived from this process.

Dr. Charles Vacanti was one of the lead researchers from the team at Brigham and Womens Hospital. And he joins me now.

Dr. Vacanti, this is kind of amazing. Are you explaining are you telling us youre making stem cells, instead of finding them?

DR. CHARLES VACANTI, Brigham & Womens Hospital: That is correct. And we believe were doing exactly whats being done in the body when you normally have an injury.

GWEN IFILL: So how did you come about this?

CHARLES VACANTI: Its been a long process.

I started working with this with my brother Martin about 15 years ago, first looking for a better cell to use in tissue engineering. And in 2001, we described a stem cell that we thought we had found, and several years later, we started to wonder, rather than finding the cell, were we making the cell with the harsh environment of the isolation process?

GWEN IFILL: And thats the acid bath I was just referring to?

CHARLES VACANTI: Yes.

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Researchers make stem cell discovery by studying tissue stress and repair