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New Study Shows Stem Cell Value for Patients with Advanced Heart Failure
Wireless News
06 June 2005
Patients with advanced heart failure significantly improved after receiving stem cell therapy, according to results of a small clinical trial presented today at the annual meeting of the International Society for Minimally Invasive Cardiothoracic Surgery (ISMICS).
The study showed that 30 days after receiving the stem cells by injection into their hearts, patients improved an average of 41 percent in their hearts' pumping efficiency and the distance they could walk nonstop increased by 72 percent in a standard test widely used to assess heart patients.
After 90 days, the heart-pumping improvements were sustained and patients further improved the distance they could walk in the standard test by an additional 16 percent compared to 30 days and doubled compared to baseline.
The study is the first to use human fetal-derived stem cell therapy in patients with heart failure. The surgical procedure was performed by Drs. Federico Benetti, Luis Geffner, Yuliy Baltaytis and Teodoro Maldonado at Luis Vernaza Hospital in Guayaquil, Ecuador.
"This is the first-ever study to use human fetal-derived stem cell therapy in patients with heart failure and, though from a small group of patients, the results are very compelling and demand additional research," said Valavanur Subramanian, MD, chairman of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Lenox Hill Hospital, New York City, and the study's senior investigator.
"It was especially gratifying to see these patients, many of whom couldn't walk more than a short distance without losing their breath, improve their ability to perform physical activities that are a part of everyday living," he said.
In the study, 10 patients with advanced-stage heart failure underwent open chest surgery during which human fetal-derived stem cells were injected into their hearts. Before and 30 and 90 days after the procedure, patients were assessed for the severity of their heart failure (stage 1-4), based on standard New York Heart Association (NYHA) criteria.
"These results suggest a potential for changing the trajectory of heart failure," said Barnett Suskind, CEO of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine, which provided the unrestricted grant for the study. "We are committed to supporting and performing stem cell research to move to therapeutic applications. We will follow these patients to obtain additional, longer-term data, as well as perform variations of the procedure in new patients as part of an extension of this study."
"In addition, we are currently evaluating stem cell therapy in a variety of other disease conditions, and we will begin additional studies in diabetes, neurological disorders, spinal cord injuries and other conditions over the next year," Suskind said.
The stem cells used in the study were provided by the Institute for Regenerative Medicine and prepared from fetal tissues from legally consenting, non-compensated donors outside the U.S. who underwent terminated ectopic pregnancies, elective abortions or spontaneous miscarriages.
Prior to use, the cells were screened for viral, bacterial and fungal pathogens, similar to but more rigorous than screening tests used for human blood and organs. Each patient received 60-80 million cells.
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