Stem Cell Clinic

Harrison County Man Seeking Stem Cell Treatment to Restore Vision

By Stem Cell Treatment

For some people battling illness, stem cell research has proven to make all the difference in their treatment, and a Harrison County man is hoping to join the ranks of those success stories.

Bobby Swiger works at the YMCA in Clarksburg as a personal trainer and goes to school full time for massage therapy. But for Swiger, life is a little more challenging than one would envision.

"I don't want to be the outsider anymore," said Swiger.

As a child, Swiger was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa, or RP, a degenerative disease he inherited from his mother.

"I was always forced to carry large books to school, large print. So I was always kind of noticed more than I wanted to be. At one point, I actually had a large screen monitor which I had to use to read my books with," said Swiger.

"I learned little tricks to get around it, and I've learned how to trick people to thinking I was normal," said Swiger.

Like others suffering from RP, Swiger is legally blind. During the day, he can see blurred images, but in the dark, everything goes black - literally.

"I'm not really a bar person, but I would like the opportunity to go to a bar and get a drink if I want, but I can't, because if I go into a bar, I'm gonna run into people, probably cause a bar fight 'cause I can't see the guy in front of me," said Swiger.

When it comes to his classes, Swiger says he relies heavily on the help of his teachers at the Clarksburg Beauty Academy, and at home, his girlfriend.But he's ready to be more independent with the help of stem cell treatment.

"They'll take the stem cells out of my hip and inject it into my eye itself. One individual who has had this treatment before me, at the same level I am currently, he was increased to 20/80, which is enormous," said Swiger.

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Harrison County Man Seeking Stem Cell Treatment to Restore Vision

Man hoping for third stem cell match after first 2 donors back out

By Stem Cell Doctors

Watch the video above:Leukemia patient Chris Taylor loses 2nd bone marrow transplant donor. Angie Seth reports.

TORONTO A 36-year-old leukemia patient is searching for a bone marrow donor for the third time, after his first two donors backed out for medical or unknown reasons.

Chris Taylor was diagnosed with leukemia in 2012. He originally went to Mount Sinai hospital with chest pains and spent several days in the ICU though doctors couldnt figure out what was wrong with him, he said.

But several weeks later, Princess Margaret Hospital found his cancer at the chromosomal level. HE immediately started chemotherapy and it went into remission.

It came back after ten months, he said. I was starting to feel better and the side effects were starting to wear off and then the cancer came back.

They found a match around Christmas of 2013, he said. They started preliminary testing and even got a proposed date but two days before, the donor pulled out.

Unfortunately that donor was medically unfit to donate, Taylor said.

So they went back to searching. They found another donor.

We began again the process of getting ready to go in for the transplant, he said. Unfortunately for unknown reasons that donor had to opt-out of the procedure.

I was disappointed but I dont hold any ill-will or anything like that.

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Man hoping for third stem cell match after first 2 donors back out

Leukemia patient pins hopes on OneMatch stem cell donor registry

By Stem Cell Doctors

Each day is a gift for Chris Taylor and every phone call could be the one that saves his life.

Thats why the 36-year-old man with acute myeloid leukemia keeps his cellphone within reach, waiting to hear that a stem cell donor has been found and hell get the bone marrow transplant he needs.

Taylor, who was diagnosed in July 2012, has already had two false alarms but is confident a match will become available before its too late.

Getting the call is a miracle in itself. It comes after an online search of unrelated people by the Canadian Blood Services OneMatch Stem Cell and Marrow Network. The registry has access to 22 million potential volunteer donors in 71 countries, strangers prepared to help those like Taylor.

Despite popular belief, family members are matches only 25 per cent of the time, said Mary-Lynn Pride, a patient transplant liaison specialist at OneMatch.

More than 800 Canadians currently await transplants. OneMatch has more than 333,000 registered Canadian donors.

Taylor signed up after a second round of chemotherapy last summer, when doctors at Princess Margaret Hospital advised he needed a bone marrow transplant.

Taylor received the first call last November. The timing was perfect because his cancer was in remission, the only time a transplant can be done.

Two days before he was to be admitted to hospital, Taylor got bad news. The procedure was cancelled because the donor had unspecified medical complications, he said. OneMatch does not say why donors decide to abandon the procedure.

The second call came last month, but the donor withdrew for reasons unknown to Taylor.

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Leukemia patient pins hopes on OneMatch stem cell donor registry

Stem Cells | ICMS — Advancing Stem Cell Treatments, Stem …

By Stem Cell Medicine

T he International Cellular Medicine Society (ICMS) is an international non-profit dedicated to patient safety through strict evaluation of protocols and rigorous oversight of clinics and facilities engaged in the translation of point-of-care cell-based treatments.As a Professional Medical Association, the ICMS represents Physiciansand Researchersfrom over 35 countries who share a mission to provide Scientifically Credible and Medically Appropriate Treatments to Informed Patients.Join the ICMS.

The ICMS Works Tirelessly for the Clincial Translation of Field of Cell-Based Point-of-Care Treatments through:

Comprehensive Medical Standards and Best Practice Guidelines for Cell Based Medicine,

Strict Evaluation and Rigerous Oversight of Stem Cell Clinics and Facilities through aGlobal Accreditation Process,

Physician Education through daily updates on the latest Research on Stem Cells, the monthly Currents In Stem Cell Medicine and the annual International Congress for Regenerative and Stem Cell Medicine.

Join the ICMSto receive the latest news and research from cell-based medicne, including the bi-monthly publication, Currents in Stem Cell Medicine.

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Stem Cells | ICMS -- Advancing Stem Cell Treatments, Stem ...

Scientist admits mistakes in stem cell 'discovery'

By Stem Cell Medicine

The Japanese scientists who made an apparently groundbreaking discovery in the field of stem cell research earlier this year has called for his research to be withdrawn amid speculations about the validity of the findings.

In January the researcher claimed to have discovered that stem cells could be made quickly and cheaply by simply dipping cells in acid to convert them into the biological building blocks. But the images used in the report were brought into question and other teams of researchers have failed to emulate the results.

The study's author Professor Teruhiko Wakayama said, "It is no longer clear what is right."

Stem cells are set to play a vital role in the future of regenerative medicine as they can transform into any other type of tissue. Teams of scientists are exploring their application in restoring sight to the blind and mending damage caused by heart attacks.

The original study was published in the journal Nature and hit headlines after being branded a

"major scientific discovery" as it suggested stem cells no longer had to be taken from embryos or made with complex and costly genetic manipulation.

While the pioneering findings, which suggested simply shocking cells with acid could cause them to revert to stem cells, has not been discredited it has been called into question.

Wakayama reportedly told Japanese TV, "When conducting the experiment, I believed it was absolutely right. But now that many mistakes have emerged, I think it is best to withdraw the research paper at once and, using correct data and correct pictures, to prove once again the paper is right.

"If it turns out to be wrong, we would need to make it clear why a thing like this happened."

WENN.com

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Scientist admits mistakes in stem cell 'discovery'

Bioquark Inc. Announces the Appointment of Dr. Luis Martinez, MD, MPH, Regenerative Medicine and Cell Therapy …

By Uncategorized

Philadelphia, PA (PRWEB) March 13, 2014

Bioquark, Inc., (http://www.bioquark.com) a company focused on the development of combinatorial biologics for regeneration and disease reversion in human organs and tissues, today announces the appointment of Dr. Luis Martinez, MD, MPH, as VP of Global Operations.

We are honored to have someone with Dr. Martinezs experience join us as we execute on a globalized strategy in regenerative medicine, said Ira S. Pastor, CEO, Bioquark Inc. His broad clinical experience in applied regenerative medicine and cellular therapies make him a very valuable addition to the Bioquark team.

Dr. Martinez is a regenerative medicine and cell therapy specialist with over 10 years of experience in the clinical setting. He is currently the President of Elite Regenerative Medicine Group, a premier treatment and research center specializing in cell therapy applications for therapeutic, regenerative and preventive purposes. Dr. Martinez obtained his medical degree, as well as his Master of Public Health, at the Ponce School of Medicine and Health Sciences, and completed his residency at the prestigious University of Pennsylvania. He also completed a fellowship in biosecurity with the UPMC Center for Health Security. He is currently a clinical instructor at the Ponce School of Medicine and Health Sciences and is a board certified physician. Dr. Martinez also serves as vice-president of the XanoGene Anti-Aging Clinic and is President at Xyrion Medical, a biomedical consulting firm. He is a current consultant for multiple biomedical and pharmaceutical companies and conducts clinical research for various clients in the industry. Dr. Martinez is also a renowned international speaker, speaking at multiple venues for professional and academic organizations and he offers training to physicians in multiple applications of regenerative medicine, including Platelet Rich Plasma (PRP) therapy, adipose and bone marrow stem cell derived harvesting, preparation and therapeutic administration, as well as cytokine, growth factor and peptide therapies.

I am very excited about the biologic candidates being developed at Bioquark Inc. and their very novel approach to human regeneration and disease reversion, which has broad clinical applicability towards a range of degenerative disorders," said Dr. Martinez. "I'm pleased to be joining the team and am looking forward to playing a more active role in this truly transformational platform."

About Bioquark, Inc.

Bioquark Inc. is focused on the development of biologic based products that have the ability to alter the regulatory state of human tissues and organs, with the goal of curing a wide range of diseases, as well as effecting complex regeneration. Bioquark is developing biological pharmaceutical candidates, as well as products for the global consumer health and wellness market segments.

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Bioquark Inc. Announces the Appointment of Dr. Luis Martinez, MD, MPH, Regenerative Medicine and Cell Therapy ...

Dr. Jeffrey Adler Presents on Use of Stem Cell Therapy at Graham International Implant Symposium

By Stem Cell Treatment

St. Petersburg, Floriday (PRWEB) March 13, 2014

Dr. Jeffrey Adler of Adler Footcare New York is presenting at the 7th Annual Graham International Implant Symposium, a two-day event that brings together foot and ankle specialists to present and attend lectures on the latest in foot and ankle topics. Dr. Adler will be speaking on the use of stem cells in the first MP (metacarpophalangeal) joint surgery.

Stem Cell Replacement Therapy offers an advanced treatment option for problems like plantar fasciitis, Osteoarthritis, Achilles tendonitis and torn soft tissue.

Stem Cell Replacement Therapy is proving to be much more effective and long lasting than traditional treatments.

In the past common foot problems have been treated by physical therapy or orthotic therapy, but the results have often been poor, leaving patients continuing to struggle with the foot pain.

Stem cells are used by many physicians to treat a broad variety of conditions because of their ability to either replicate themselves or change into the cell type that is needed to repair the tissue that has been damaged. The New York podiatrists at Adler Footcare introduce live birth stem cells into the affected area. When a patient comes in for stem cell therapy, the affected area is carefully measured so the stem cells can be delivered directly to the area that needs the treatment.

Stem cell treatment helps patients heal much quicker and allows them to return to their normal activities much sooner, Dr. Adler said. Actual recovery time will depend on each individual patients general health and medical diagnosis, but in the end they will be able to live life without chronic foot pain.

Treatments using stem cells have been used by physicians for over 100 years. Stem Cell Replacement Therapy is covered by commercial insurance and Medicare, and is approved and regulated by the FDA. The product is tested and screened by medical professionals to eliminate the potential of any communicable diseases.

Graham International Implant Institute

The Graham International Implant Institute (GIII) is a global-reaching organization dedicated to research, training, certification and support on implantology for foot physicians worldwide.

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Dr. Jeffrey Adler Presents on Use of Stem Cell Therapy at Graham International Implant Symposium

Stem cells inside sutures could improve healing in Achilles tendon injuries

By Stem Cell Doctors

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

12-Mar-2014

Contact: Camille Gamboa camille.gamboa@sagepub.com 805-410-7441 SAGE Publications

Los Angeles, CA (March 12, 2014) Researchers have found that sutures embedded with stem cells led to quicker and stronger healing of Achilles tendon tears than traditional sutures, according to a new study published in the March 2014 issue of Foot & Ankle International (published by SAGE).

Achilles tendon injuries are common for professional, collegiate and recreational athletes. These injuries are often treated surgically to reattach or repair the tendon if it has been torn. Patients have to keep their legs immobilized for a while after surgery before beginning their rehabilitation. Athletes may return to their activities sooner, but risk rerupturing the tendon if it has not healed completely.

Drs. Lew Schon, Samuel Adams, and Elizabeth Allen and Researchers Margaret Thorpe, Brent Parks, and Gary Aghazarian from MedStar Union Memorial Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, conducted the study. They compared traditional surgery, surgery with stem cells injected in the injury area, and surgery with special sutures embedded with stem cells in rats. The results showed that the group receiving the stem cell sutures healed better.

"The exciting news from this early work is that the stem cells stayed in the tendon, promoting healing right away, during a time when patients are not able to begin aggressive rehabilitation. When people can't fully use their leg, the risk is that atrophy sets in and adhesions can develop which can impact how strong and functional the muscle and tendon are after it is reattached," said Dr. Schon. "Not only did the stem cells encourage better healing at the cellular level, the tendon strength itself was also stronger four weeks following surgery than in the other groups in our study," he added.

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For further information on how to take care of your feet and ankles, or to find a local orthopaedic foot and ankle surgeon, visit the American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society patient website at http://www.footcaremd.org.

"Stem Cell-Bearing Suture Improves Achilles Tendon Healing in a Rat Model" by Samuel B. Adams, Jr, MD; Margaret A. Thorpe, BS; Brent G. Parks, MSc; Gary Aghazarian, BS; Elizabeth Allen, MD; and Lew C. Schon, MD in the March 2014 Foot & Ankle International.

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Stem cells inside sutures could improve healing in Achilles tendon injuries

Top Las Vegas Pain Management Clinic, Nevada Pain, Now Offering Stem Cell Therapy to Help Avoid Joint Replacement

By Stem Cell Medicine

Las Vegas, Nevada (PRWEB) March 12, 2014

The top Las Vegas pain management centers, Nevada Pain, are now offering regenerative medicine treatments including stem cell therapy and platelet rich plasma therapy. These treatments offer significant potential for repairing injured soft tissues and arthritis. Call (702) 323-0553 for more information and scheduling.

Traditional pain management treatments typically work exceptionally well, however, they act as a proverbial "band aid" to mask pain. Regenerative medicine, on the other hand, may regenerate damaged tissue while providing exceptional pain relief.

Treatments are offered by the Board Certified, Award Winning Las Vegas pain management doctors at Nevada Pain. Platelet rich plasma therapy is one of the treatments offered, which involves a simple blood draw from the patient. The blood is spun rapidly to create a mixture of concentrated platelets and growth factors, which is then injected into the problem area.

Stem cell injections involve treatments with either bone marrow, fat derived or amniotic derived material. The injections are offered as an outpatient and involve very little risk. Each treatment provides a significant concentration of growth factors and stem cells to help with repair.

In addition to regenerative medicine options, Nevada Pain offers over 50 pain management treatments including radiofrequency ablation, spinal cord stimulator implants, several types of epidural injections, and all kinds of nerve blocks. Success rates at the clinic typically exceed 90%.

For more information and scheduling, call (702) 323-0553.

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Top Las Vegas Pain Management Clinic, Nevada Pain, Now Offering Stem Cell Therapy to Help Avoid Joint Replacement

Has The Holy Grail Been Found In Stem Cell Medicine?

By Uncategorized

Last week, the scientific world was intrigued by a study in Nature magazine showing that an acidic environment turned adult mouse cells into "pluripotent" stem cells. The researchers called these new pluripotent cells "stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency cells" (STAP). This could have rather game changing consequences in the stem cell field. Notice I said could! This is no doubt a tremendous scientific feat. However we still do not know what road blocks might arise in using these cells. First of all these cells were grown from mice. To take poetic justice from a familiar phrase "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas" well sometimes what happens in mice sometimes stays in mice. Clinical translation from one species does not always relate to another species. One need look no further than cancer drugs. Sometimes we find some tremendously successful cancer drugs in an animal trial only to find that it has little or no effect on human tissue. I have some specific questions on these cells that I will mention later in this blog.

The simplicity of producing these cells is when a batch of cells was exposed to a "sub-lethal" acidic environment, with a pH of 5.7, for 30 minutes. I am more convinced than ever than stress will trigger many different reactions in cells. This seems to be a prevailing thread in the stem cell field. Stress will make a cell change its characteristics. The cell can become much more powerful accomplishing repair. In one of my blogs from a few months ago I talked about MUSE cells. MUSE cells are called Multilinage Stress Enduring Cells derived from adipose tissue. These are pluripotent like stem cells derived from adipose tissue. They have an uncanny ability to survive. You will remember that MUSE cells were produced when fat tissue was subjected to harsh environments. It sort of sounds familiar. If we substitute the word STAP cell for a MUSE cell we find strikingly similar aspects of these cells. We start seeing a similar pattern. Some type of stress seems to be a a precipitating event in producing these cells.

To investigate whether the STAP cells could occur in mammals some studies were performed by Vacanti, Obokata and their group. They used mice that were bred to carry a gene that glows green in the presence of Oct-4, a protein that is only found in pluripotent cells. The team took a blood sample from the spleen of these mice when they were one week old, isolated white blood cells called lymphocytes, and exposed them to various strong but fleeting physical and chemical stresses. The team then tried to grow the cells in the lab. Not much happened at first some cells died, and the rest still looked like white blood cells. But on the second day, a number of cells began to glow green, meaning they were producing Oct-4. By day 7, two-thirds of the surviving cells showed this pluripotent marker, together with other genetic markers of pluripotency many of which are also seen in embryonic stem cells. The researchers don't know whether the reprogramming they are seeing is initiated by the low pH or by some other type of stress, such as chemical changes happening further down the line. What we may be doing is turning on genes that were previously turned off. The process of genes being turned off is called gene silencing. As we age many of our genes become silenced. Silenced genes can cause disease. We know that young people have many genes that are turned on and thus they seem as a group to avoid disease. As we age these genes become silenced and disease rears its ugly head.

It might just be that the creation of STAP cells is tapping into a fundamental body-repair process of life. I have suspected for some time now that repair depends upon the severity of the injury. If you injure cells significantly enough, so that they almost die, than certain genes may get switched on or off. This may result in a change in the cell's overall controls, meaning all genes have the potential to be switched on again. This may be the essence of life. We may have stumbled onto the master switch of life. This could happen in all tissue in the body under different circumstances.

There are some reports that these cells are totipotent. A pluripotential stem cell can form almost any kind of tissue. Pluripotent cells, such as embryonic stem cells, can form any cell in an embryo but not a placenta. Totipotent cells, however, can form any cell in an embryo and a placenta. These totipotent stem cells have the ability to creat life. The only cells known to be naturally totipotent are in embryos that have only undergone the first couple of cell divisions immediately after fertilization. This may end up in a Pandora's box. Might humanity go down the slippery slope of cloning a human being. I think this is a place most of humanity does not and should not want to go.

The potential for these cells is great. Some of the questions I have about these cells is for instance what about their telomeres. We have taken an adult cell and reprogramed it but what about its telomeres? Would we have the short telomere length that we would expect it a typical mature cell or would the telomeres lengthen? We know that pluripotent and higher stem cells make telomerase. Telomerase is the enzyme that restores the ends of the DNA strains. Every time a cell reproduces it loses a little snippet of DNA. Once the DNA strand approaches a certain critical level the cell becomes programed to die in a process called apotheosis. Telomerase restores the telomere end. Could we potentially use these STAP cells to not only repair damaged cells but maybe reverse aging. It seems that the more we know the less we know.

Thanks Dr. P

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Has The Holy Grail Been Found In Stem Cell Medicine?

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