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Stem cell therapy in Bangkok Thailand Vejthani
Hospital
Vejthani Hospital is located in Bangkok Thailand. It is one of
the leading hospitals in Bangkok for stem cell treatment and therapy.
Their website is located at www.vejthani.com
Their English Hotline phone number : (+66)8-522 38888 and the address
of the Hospital is 1 Ladprao Road 111, Klong-Chan Bangkapi,Bangkok
10240
Stem Cells Research and Treatments in Thailand at Vejthani Hospital
Stem cells treatments are a type of cells therapy that introduce
new cells into damaged tissue in order to treat a disease or injury.
Many medical researchers believe that stem cells treatments have
the potential to change the face of human disease and alleviate
suffering. The ability of stem cells to self-renew and give rise
to subsequent generations that can differentiate offers a large
potential to culture tissues that can replace diseased and damaged
tissues in the body, without the risk of rejection.
A number of stem cells treatments exist, although most are still
experimental and/or costly, with the notable exception of bone marrow
transplantation. Medical researchers anticipate one day being able
to use technologies derived from adult and embryonic stem cells
research to treat cancer, Type 1 diabetes mellitus, Parkinson's
disease, Huntington's disease, cardiac failure, muscle damage and
neurological disorders, along with many others.
More research is needed concerning both stem cells behavior and
the mechanisms of the diseases they could be used to treat before
most of these experimental treatments become realities
Current Stem Cells treatments
For over 30 years, bone marrow, and more recently, umbilical cord
blood stem cells have been used to treat cancer patients with conditions
such as leukemia and lymphoma. During chemotherapy, most growing
cells are killed by the cytotoxic agents. These agents not only
kill the leukemia or neoplastic cells, but also the haematopoietic
stem cells within the bone marrow. It is this side effect of the
chemotherapy that the stem cells transplant attempts to reverse;
the donor's healthy bone marrow reintroduces functional stem cells
to replace those lost in the treatment.
Potential Stem Cells Treatments
Brain damage
Stroke and traumatic brain injury lead to cells death, characterized
by a loss of neurons and oligodendrocytes within the brain. Healthy
adult brains contain neural stem cells, these divide and act to
maintain general stem cells numbers or become progenitor cells.
In healthy adult animals, progenitor cells migrate within the brain
and function primarily to maintain neuron populations for olfaction
(the sense of smell). Interestingly, in pregnancy and after injury,
this system appears to be regulated by growth factors and can increase
the rate at which new brain matter is formed. In the case of brain
injury, although the reparative process appears to initiate, substantial
recovery is rarely observed in adults, suggesting a lack of robustness.
Stem cells may also be used to treat brain degeneration, such as
in Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease.
Cancer
Research injecting neural (adult) stem cells into the brains of
dogs has shown to be very successful in treating cancerous tumors.
With traditional techniques brain cancer is almost impossible to
treat because it spreads so rapidly. Researchers at the Harvard
Medical School induced intracranial tumours in rodents. Then, they
injected human neural stem cells. Within days the cells had migrated
into the cancerous area and produced cytosine deaminase, an enzyme
that converts a non-toxic pro-drug into a chemotheraputic agent.
As a result, the injected substance was able to reduce tumor mass
by 81 percent. The stem cells neither differentiated nor turned
tumorigenic.[4] Some researchers believe that the key to finding
a cure for cancer is to inhibit cancer stem cells, where the cancer
tumor originates. Currently, cancer treatments are designed to kill
all cancer cells, but through this method, researchers would be
able to develop drugs to specifically target these stem cells.
Spinal cord injury
A team of Korean researchers reported on November 25, 2004, that
they had transplanted multipotent adult stem cells from an umbilical
cord blood to a patient suffering from a spinal cord injury and
that she can now walk on her own, without difficulty. The patient
had not been able stand up for roughly 19 years. For the unprecedented
clinical test, the scientists isolated adult stem cells from umbilical
cord blood and then injected them into the damaged part of the spinal
cord.
According to the October 7, 2005 issue of The Week, University
of California researchers injected human embryonic stem cells into
paralyzed mice, which resulted in the mice regaining the ability
to move and walk four months later. The researchers discovered upon
dissecting the mice that the stem cells regenerated not only the
neurons, but also the cells of the myelin sheath, a layer of cells
which insulates neural impulses and speeds them up, facilitating
communication with the brain (damage to which is often the cause
of neurological injury in humans).
In January 2005, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
differentiated human blastocyst stem cells into neural stem cells,
then into the beginnings of motor neurons, and finally into spinal
motor neuron cells, the cells type that, in the human body, transmits
messages from the brain to the spinal cord. The newly generated
motor neurons exhibited electrical activity, the signature action
of neurons. Lead researcher Su-Chun Zhang described the process
as "you need to teach the blastocyst stem cells to change step
by step, where each step has different conditions and a strict window
of time."
Transforming blastocyst stem cells into motor neurons had eluded
researchers for decades. The next step will be to test if the newly
generated neurons can communicate with other cells when transplanted
into a living animal; the first test will be in chicken embryos.
Su-Chun said their trial-and-error study helped them learn how motor
neuron cells, which are key to the nervous system, develop in the
first place. The new cells could be used to treat diseases like
Lou Gehrig's disease, muscular dystrophy, and spinal cord injuries.
Heart damage
Several clinical trials targeting heart disease have shown that
adult stem cells therapy is safe and effective, and is equally efficient
in old as well as recent infarcts. Adult stem cells therapy for
heart disease was commercially available on at least five continents
at the last count (2007).
Possible mechanisms are:
• Generation of heart muscle cells
• Stimulation of growth of new blood vessels that repopulate
the heart tissue
• Secretion of growth factors, rather than actually incorporating
into the heart
• Assistance via some other mechanism
It may be possible to have adult bone marrow cells differentiate
into heart muscle cells.
Haematopoiesis (blood cells formation)
The specificity of the human immune cells repertoire is what allows
the human body to defend itself from rapidly adapting antigen. However,
this system it a hot spot for degradation upon the pathogenesis
of disease, and because of the critical role that it plays in organismal
defense, its degradation is often fatal to the system as a whole.
Diseases of hematopoietic cells are called hematopathology. The
specificity of one's immune cells repertoire, which allows it to
recognize foreign antigen, causes further challenges in the treatment
of immune disease. Identical matches between donor and recipient
must be made for successful transplantation treatments, while matches
are uncommon, even between first-degree relatives. Research using
both hematopoietic adult stem cells and embryonic stem cells has
contributed great insight into possible mechanisms and methods of
treatment for many of these ailments.
Fully mature human red blood cells may be generated ex vivo by
hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), which are precursors of red blood
cells. In this process, HSCs are grown together with stromal cells,
creating an environment that mimics the conditions of bone marrow,
the natural site of red blood cells growth. Erythropoietin, a growth
factor, is added, coaxing the stem cells to complete terminal differentiation
into red blood cells. Further research into this technique should
have potential benefits to gene therapy, blood transfusion, and
topical medicine.
Baldness
Hair follicles also contain stem cells, and some researchers predict
research on these follicle stem cells may lead to successes in treating
baldness through "hair multiplication", also known as
"hair cloning". This treatment is expected to work through
taking stem cells from existing follicles, multiplying them in cultures,
and implanting the new follicles into the scalp. Later treatments
may be able to simply signal follicle stem cells to give off chemical
signals to nearby follicle cells which have shrunk during the aging
process, which in turn respond to these signals by regenerating
and once again making healthy hair.
Missing teeth
In 2004, scientists at King's College London discovered a way to
cultivate a complete tooth in mice and were able to grow them stand-alone
in the laboratory. Researchers are confident that this technology
can be used to grow live teeth in human patients.
In theory, stem cells taken from the patient could be coaxed in
the lab into turning into a tooth bud which, when implanted in the
gums, will give rise to a new tooth, which would be expected to
take two months to grow. It will fuse with the jawbone and release
chemicals that encourage nerves and blood vessels to connect with
it. The process is similar to what happens when humans grow their
original adult teeth.
Many challenges remain, however, before stem cells could be a choice
for the replacement of missing teeth in the future.
Deafness
There has been success in re-growing cochlea hair cells with the
use of stem cells.
Blindness and vision impairment
Since 2003, researchers have successfully transplanted retinal
stem cells into damaged eyes to restore vision. Using embryonic
stem cells, scientists are able to grow a thin sheet of totipotent
stem cells in the laboratory. When these sheets are transplanted
over the damaged retina, the stem cells stimulate renewed repair,
eventually restoring vision. The latest such development was in
June 2005, when researchers at the Queen Victoria Hospital of Sussex,
England were able to restore the sight of forty patients using the
same technique. The group, led by Dr. Sheraz Daya, was able to successfully
use adult stem cells obtained from the patient, a relative, or even
a cadaver. Further rounds of trials are ongoing.
In April 2005, doctors in the UK transplanted corneal stem cells
from an organ donor to the cornea of Deborah Catlyn, a woman who
was blinded in one eye when an acid was thrown in her eye at a nightclub.
The cornea, which is the transparent window of the eye, is a particularly
suitable site for transplants. In fact, the first successful human
transplant was a cornea transplant. The cornea has the remarkable
property that it does not contain any blood vessels, making it relatively
easy to transplant. The majority of corneal transplants carried
out today are due to a degenerative disease called keratoconus.
The University Hospital of New Jersey claims a success rate growing
the new cells from transplanted stem cells varies from 25 percent
to 70 percent.
In 2009, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Medical center
demonstrated that stem cells collected from human corneas can restore
transparency without provoking a rejection response in mice with
corneal damage.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
Stem cells have cured rats with an Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-like
disease. The rats were injected with a virus to kill the spinal
cord motor nerves related to leg movement, succeeded by injections
of stem cells into their spinal cords. These migrated (passed through
many layers of tissues) to the sites of injury where they were able
to regenerate the dead nerve cells restoring the rats which were
once again able to walk.
Graft vs. host disease and Crohn's disease
Phase III clinical trials expected to end in second-quarter 2008
were conducted by Osiris Therapeutics using their in-development
product Prochymal, derived from adult bone marrow. The target disorders
of this therapeutic are graft-versus-host disease and Crohn's disease.
Neural and behavioral birth defects
A team of researchers led by Prof. Joseph Yanai were able to reverse
learning deficits in the offspring of pregnant mice who were exposed
to heroin and the pesticide organophosphate. This was done by direct
neural stem cells transplantation into the brains of the offspring.
The recovery was almost 100 percent, as proved in behavioral tests
in which the treated animals improved to normal behavior and learning
scores after the transplantation. On the molecular level, brain
chemistry of the treated animals was also restored to normal. Through
the work, which was supported by the US National Institutes of Health,
the US-Israel Binational Science Foundation and the Israel anti-drug
authorities, the researchers discovered that the stem cells worked
even in cases where most of the cells died out in the host brain.
The scientists found that before they die the neural stem cells
succeed in inducing the host brain to produce large numbers of stem
cells which repair the damage. These findings, which answered a
major question in the stem cells research community, were published
earlier this year in the leading journal, Molecular Psychiatry.
Scientists are now developing procedures to administer the neural
stem cells in the least invasive way possible - probably via blood
vessels, making therapy practical and clinically feasible. Researchers
also plan to work on developing methods to take cells from the patient's
own body, turn them into stem cells, and then transplant them back
into the patient's blood via the blood stream. Aside from decreasing
the chances of immunological rejection, the approach will also eliminate
the controversial ethical issues involved in the use of stem cells
from human embryos.
Diabetes
Diabetes patients lose the function of their insulin-producing
beta cells of their pancreas. Human embryonic stem cells may be
grown in cells culture and stimulated to form insulin-producing
cells that can be transplanted into the patient.
However, success depends on developing procedures in all required
steps:
Have the cells proliferate and generate sufficient amount of tissue
• Differentiation into the right cells type
• Survival of the cells in the recipient (prevention of transplant
rejection)
• Integration with the surrounding tissue in the body
• Function appropriately in long-term
Orthopedics
Clinical case reports in the treatment of orthopedic conditions
have been reported. To date, the focus in the literature for musculoskeletal
care appears to be on mesenchymal stem cells. Centeno et al. have
published MRI evidence of increased cartilage and meniscus volume
in individual human subjects, though it is unclear how the MRI results
compare to clinical response. However, each of these articles only
describes one lucky individual and the results of trials including
more patients are yet to be published making it hard to extrapolate
the efficacy and safety. It has also yet to be shown that these
results apply to a larger group of patients.
Wakitani has also published a small case series of nine defects
in five knees involving surgical transplantation of mesenchymal
stem cells with coverage of the treated chondral defects.
Wound healing
In one experimental method in regenerative medicine, stem cells
are used to stimulate the growth of human tissues. In an adult,
wounded tissue is most often replaced by scar tissue, which is characterized
in the skin by disorganized collagen structure, loss of hair follicles
and irregular vascular structure. In the case of wounded fetal tissue,
however, wounded tissue is replaced with normal tissue through the
activity of stem cells. A possible method for tissue regeneration
in adults is to place adult stem cells "seeds" inside
a tissue bed "soil" in a wound bed and allow the stem
cells to stimulate differentiation in the tissue bed cells. This
method elicits a regenerative response more similar to fetal wound-healing
than adult scar tissue formation. Researchers are still investigating
different aspects of the "soil" tissue that are conducive
to regeneration.
Stem cell therapy in Bangkok Thailand
Vejthani Hospital
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