Boy Still Doing Well After Receiving Stem Cell Windpipe Transplant

July 27, 2012

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

Stem cell research has made yet another stride, as one boy who received a trachea is showing a remarkable recovery.

Researchers writing in the journal The Lancet said the child who received a new windpipe built with his own stem cells is doing well and is back in school.

Ciaran Finn-Lynch was born with long-segment tracheal stenosis, which causes breathing difficulties. Due to his condition, his lungs collapsed on the day he was born, so he had to have major surgery to reconstruct his airways when he was just six days old.

In 2009, one of the metal tubes that were used to hold open his airways damaged the main blood vessel coming out of his heart.

Finn-Lynch had to undergo ground-breaking surgery at Londons Great Ormond Street Hospital in 2010. Doctors said that this procedure was the boys only option.

The doctors took a donor windpipe, and stripped it of all the donors cells. Stem cells were then taken from Ciarans bone marrow, and were sprayed onto the newly transplanted windpipe.

Tiny sections of lining from his original windpipe were patched on to the replacement. This prompted the stem cells to turn into the right kind of tissue and help start the growth of the windpipe lining.

He was also fitted with a biodegradable stent to help keep his airway open for the first six months while the windpipe began to grow back into place.

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Boy Still Doing Well After Receiving Stem Cell Windpipe Transplant