Stem cell trials will use heart patients

Yesterday's Sunday Times carried a story on Ireland's first human trial of stem cells on heart patients which will commence shortly.

10 patients suffering from chronic heart conditions will have stem cells grafted on to their hearts, to see if this helps to repair the organs. The hope is that the patient's own stem cells can repair the damaged area, avoiding the need for a transplant.

In order to obtain stem cells, bone marrow will be extracted from patients’ pelvises and over three to six weeks hundreds of millions of cells will be grown in the laboratory from a base of 50,000. They will then be grafted into the patients’ hearts.

It is hoped that gene therapy will prove so successful that it will eventually do away with invasive operations and organ transplants.

I will stop there because, as you probably know, this procedure is already being carried out around the world and is hardly a new form of treatment. However, it goes to show that there are still a huge number of people out there who don't yet realise that stem cell therapy is alreadya viable option for some 'no-option' heart patients.

Read the full article in 'The Times' newspaper online.