Stem Cell Clinic

Stem cell work could help to stop arthritis in its tracks

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Sunday 1 Sep 2013 3:00 PM

Written byADAM LUKE

A Cambridgeshire clinic has received approval to use adult stem cells to help repair and regenerate damaged tissues and joints.

The Villar Bajwa Practice at the Spire Cambridge Lea Hospital in New Road, Impington, is the first private hospital in the UK to offer the treatment for the hip tackling the early stages of arthritis.

It is also one of only a handful of sites to do the same for the knee, in which stem cells are used to create more cartilage, helping to preserve the natural hip and knee joints and delay or prevent the need for bigger operations such as joint replacements.

The operation costs about 3,800 on the NHS and slightly more privately.

Consultant orthopaedic surgeon, Richard Villar, runs the Impington practice with Ali Bajwa.

He said: One of the Holy Grails of my speciality is to encourage gristle articular cartilage to heal.

Gristle is that shiny, white layer on the end of a bone that most will have seen on a chicken drumstick. In humans, it coats the ball of the hip, and the hip socket but it features in many other joints, too knees, shoulders, elbows, wrists, ankles, toes and even fingers.

Originally posted here:
Stem cell work could help to stop arthritis in its tracks

ProfNet Experts Available on Artwork Lighting, Stem Cell Transplants, Pediatric Cancer, More

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ProfNet Experts Available on Artwork Lighting, Stem Cell Transplants, Pediatric Cancer, More

Stem cell lab opens

Aug 30, 2013 From wire report

TALLINN - A lab suitable for production and multiplying of stem cells, unique in the Baltic States was opened in the Tehnopolis center in Tallinn on Aug. 16, reports Postimees Online. The new lab includes a so-called clean room corresponding to GMP standards, which guarantees an aseptic environment with a special monitoring and influencing system.

Creators of the lab want to develop it, together with the Cell Treatment Cluster, into a production venue necessary for the development of Estonian and European medicine that is capable of producing cell treatment products corresponding to high quality requirements.

Estonian scientists are expected to post scientific achievements and breakthroughs to the world. The prerequisite for achieving an applied breakthrough is a research-technical base and a lab with clean area that corresponds to the conditions for medicine production, said Biolaborite council member, non-profit organization Cell Treatment founder, cell biologist PhD Toomas Neuman.

Cell treatment is a future field of medicine that enables treatment of a person with stem cells taken from his own body. As a doctor and a surgeon I hope that the new lab provides an opportunity of creating and developing innovative treatment methods for global medicine, said Dr. Andrus Loog from Restorative Surgery Clinic.

More here:
Stem cell lab opens

Rejoinder to the stem cell ‘tempest’

Medical Files By Rafael Castillo M.D. Philippine Daily Inquirer

First of two parts

Last Wednesday, the leaders of close to 30 medical organizations, composed of specialists from various fields, gathered at the office of the Philippine College of Physicians (PCP) to reassert their recommendations to the Department of Health (DOH) and the Philippine Food and Drug Administration (PhilFDA) to regulate stem cell treatment (SCT) in the country.

As we said in a previous column, many local practitioners are jumping the gun and, unfortunately, sprinting in the wrong direction with their unscrupulous administration of stem cells left and right for various medical conditions. Their medical practice has not been established as safe and effective for this experimental treatment.

Some medical colleagues were quoted as saying that these medical organizations that are sounding the alarm dont realize that they are killing this promising treatment of the future. I dont think so. Theyre in fact protecting this potential form of treatment from practices that would compromise the safety of patients on the long term, and give it a bad name.

More local experience

In previous columns, weve encouraged more local experience on stem cell treatment under a research protocolwhich is also one of the strong recommendations of the PCP and other medical organizationsso we could gain expertise on it and contribute to the world literature. Unfortunately to this date, there is only one published case report (a single case) in a peer-reviewed international journal.

It is estimated that for the last five years, at least 3,000 Filipinos were given stem cell treatment locally in the big centers and small stem cell clinics which have sprouted like mushroom in Metro Manila and other key cities in the country. Its difficult to explain why there is no published reportother than the lone case reportof what has happened to all these patients given this experimental treatment.

See the article here:
Rejoinder to the stem cell ‘tempest’