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STEM CELLS FOR HEART ATTACK
If you have a few extra pounds, could that extra fat on you one day save your life? New research suggests it could help the recovery after a heart attack.
It has to do with the benefits of stem cell research. Stem cells are the so-called master cells in the body. Stem cells can become any other type of cell, whether it’s a liver cell or a brain cell, or in the case of these new studies, a heart muscle cell.
“Smoking a pack of cigarettes a day and keeping late nights put me in a situation where my cholesterol levels were very high.” At 46, Daniel Serata thought he was too young to have a heart attack. “I was told that there was a five minute window for my survival, and that if I hadn’t gotten there faster, I wouldn’t be here today,” says Daniel.
Daniel’s lucky. His heart is ok. For many, though, after a heart attack, the heart does not pump as well, putting the person at risk for heart failure.
But new research presented at a major cardiovascular conference in Washington D.C. shows that stem-cell therapy administered after angioplasty and stent to reopen a clogged heart artery may improve the recovery of heart attack patients. Six months after their procedure, patients who received emergency transplantation of bone marrow stem cells reported a marked improvement in their heart function, due to the stem cells replacing the damaged heart muscle.
Other researchers at the conference showed that stem cells obtained from fat can also improve heart function after a heart attack in pigs. These cells were infused into the blood stream 48 hours after the heart attack; this was the only treatment and the vessels were not reopened.
Fat is a rich source of stem cells, in fact, it has 100 times more stem cells than bone marrow. This study showed fat cells have the ironic potential to become healthy heart cells.
“This is a very exciting development. It may presage the newer technologies in terms of gene therapy and stem cell therapy coming a lot earlier than we’ve all been thinking,” says Nate Lebovitz, a cardiologist with Englewood Medical Center.
The researchers believe this kind of regenerative medicine, using stem cells from fat, could be the future of treating cardiac patients, planting the seeds for new muscle to replace those lost by the heart attack.
Dr. Marc Hedrick, the stem cell researcher from Macropore Biosurgery which performed the research says “Fat is really accessible and you can do it under a local anesthesia and you can get lots of stem cells. And so I think the really new thing that this provides is the ability to treat patients in real time.”
For more information, click here: http://stemcells.nih.gov/index.asp
www.macropore.com
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