BY DALSON CHEN, WINDSOR STAR MAY 3, 2010 9:43 AM

WINDSOR, Ont. — Ottawa doctors, who claim a new medical technique can cause a “very long-lasting remission,” are giving hope to multiple sclerosis patients.

“The inflammatory nature of the disease has virtually ceased in everyone who has received this transplant,” said neurologist Dr. Mark Freedman, who led the study with bone marrow transplant specialist Dr. Harold Atkins.

Freedman said he’s hesitant to say that the transplant of bone marrow stem cells can “cure” multiple sclerosis.

“I hate to use the C-word ... but we’ve induced a very long-lasting remission,” he said.

Aaron Prentice, 35, said he has been “blessed” to be part of the study, which investigates the theory that a person’s immune system can be reset.

Stem cells are harvested from the patient’s blood. Next, the patient’s immune system is destroyed through intense chemotherapy. Then the stem cells are reintroduced with the hope that when the immune system grows back, it will no longer attack the nervous system.

“Kind of like rebooting a computer,” said the Windsor man.

Multiple sclerosis causes the body’s own immune system to attack the fatty myelin sheaths that surround the axons that transmit electrical signals between the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. This hampers the ability of the cells to communicate, leading to a weakening and wasting of the muscles.

Freedman and Atkins plan to release the results of the research later this year.

Continue to read from Canada.com

UKSCF partners with MS Society to financially support clinical development

Susan Aldridge, Ph.D.

The UK Stem Cell Foundation (UKSCF) and the Multiple Sclerosis Society joined forces to accelerate the transfer of stem cell science into the clinic to help patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). Up to £1 million of seed funding is to be made available to applicants starting in September. The hope is to get Phase I/II trials of stem cells in MS under way over the next year or so, with initial results expected in 2012.

This is the first disease-specific collaboration for UKSCF, whose mission is to fund the gap between promising stem cell research and clinical trials. It was announced at a special meeting of the London Regenerative Medicine Network (LRMN) on January 14. “MS and advanced stem cell-based therapies—an ABC guide” was the first of a series of new disease-themed meetings to be hosted by LRMN.

“Everyone thinks there is potential for stem cell therapy in MS, but there have been some studies of dubious worth,” noted Mary Archer, UKSCF trustee and chairman of Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. “Benefit will only be seen from long-term clinical trials. There is no shortcut, but we are seeking to accelerate the process by joining with the MS Society.”

Stem cell therapies for MS aim to prevent or repair the demyelination of nerve fibers, which is the hallmark of the disease. Two different approaches were described at the LRMN meeting. Professor Robin Franklin, director of the MS Society Cambridge Centre for Myelin Repair, explained that a major problem in MS is that the inherent regenerative process, which would otherwise remyelinate nerve fibers, is not sustained. Therapy could be based on either transplanting myelinogenic oligodendrocytes into the patient or on promoting remyelination by endogenous neural stem cells (NSCs).

Targeting the Wnt Pathway

As long ago as 1993, Franklin and colleagues were able to show remyelination in animals by transplanting NSCs. “We thought we were not far from transplantation, but there was a problem in obtaining cells from humans.” It was not until 2008 that Steve Goldman of the University of Rochester Medical Centershowed that human NSCs can remyelinate the entire brain in a mouse model of a genetic demyelinating disease.

MS, however, is not genetic. It is an autoimmune disease, and transplanted cells are not likely to patch up damaged areas in this way. “We should be able to get the brain to repair the damage itself rather than use a transplant,” Franklin pointed out.

Continue to read from the Genetic Engineering website

• By BRENDA HAWKINS - Collier Citizen
• Posted January 20, 2010

Taking an injection of pureed sheep fetus organs mixed with saline solution may sound like something out of the television show “Fear Factor,” but for two local women suffering from multiple sclerosis, live organo cell therapy brings relief.

First injected into patients intramuscularly by Swiss doctor Prof. Paul Niehans in 1931, live cell therapy uses stem cells from other mammal species to trigger the growth of new cells in humans. The therapy is used to treat a variety of ailments from premature aging and immune deficiencies to degenerative bone disorders, liver and kidney disease and even impotence in men.

The unusual procedure is not without medical controversy regarding health benefits and resulting allergic reactions and is generally debunked in the United States.

For that reason, Naples residents Dr. Debbie Heil and RN Lisa Luthringer travel to Villa Medica in Edenkoben, Germany, twice a year for treatments under the direction of third-generation therapy physician Dr. Robert Janson-Muller.

It was Janson-Muller’s demonstrated success with treating neurological disorders such as multiple sclerosis and paralysis following stroke that caught Heil’s attention.

“MS is a mystery disease,” she says. “No one knows what causes it or whether it’s environmental, genetic or viral. It’s so unpredictable, there’s no standard course of treatment and at any moment, you can experience a new, unexpected crisis. Not one person who has MS shows symptoms or signs that follow the textbook cases.”

Heil and Luthringer met at a tea for physicians’ wives in 2000 and later founded two nonprofit organizations, the Multiple Sclerosis Center of SWFL, a support group, and the Heil Luthringer Foundation, which focuses on education.

Despite her husband’s misgivings, Heil completed her first live cell treatment in October 2002 and has completed 13 injections since. Luthringer completed her first therapy in April 2002. The following accounts detail their experiences.

> Continue reading from the Collier Citizen

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May 2009

Because there is still much debate over Stem Cell therapies, for those that want to know more, I ask that you visit both our MS Blog and Library of MS Archives.

Use the search screen at either location.

Type: Stem Cell and click enter.

The stories/articles that are posted at each site, will then appear.

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