Category Archives: Cell Medicine

Editor's Choice Academic Journal Main Category: Blood / Hematology Article Date: 27 Mar 2012 - 6:00 PDT email to a friend printer friendly opinions Current Article Ratings: According to the 20-member panel of experts, in many settings patients are receiving unnecessary transfusions in the United States. Jeffery L. Carson, M.D., Chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick, NJ, and lead author of the guideline, explained: In order to determine the best use of red blood cells to maximize clinical outcomes and to prevent the harms and costs of unnecessary transfusions, the team of researchers based their evaluation on a systematic review of studies published from 1950 to 2011. To determine the impact of restrictive transfusion strategies on red blood cell usage, the team analyzed the ratio of individuals who underwent any red cell transfusion. In addition, they also determined the clinical outcome of a restrictive strategy by analyzing overall cardiac events, mortality, non-fatal heart attack, stroke, pulmonary edema, renal failure, thromboembolism, hemorrhage, length of hospitalization, functional recovery, infection, and mental confusion. For patients with pre-existing heart disease, they recommend sticking to a restrictive transfusion strategy, while patients with symptoms of anemia … Continue reading →

Blocking "don't destroy me" signals that normally sit on the surface of tumor cells and render them resistant to immune-cell attack slows the growth of a broad range of human cancers when they're implanted in mice, researchers have found. The approach, reported by immunologists at the Stanford University School of Medicine, was effective against ovarian, breast, colon, bladder, liver, prostate and brain cancer cells. If the work can be repeated in people, the approach may someday help doctors marshal defender cells in patients' own bodies to fight cancers, the researchers said. Key to the work is a cell protein called CD47, which is already being investigated in the treatment of leukemia. CD47 sits on cell membranes and communicates with various immune cells, including macrophages, which gobble up foreign invaders in the body. It plays an important role in the normal life cycle of healthy red blood cells, telling macrophages to leave the cells alone. In the study, the scientists injected the animals with antibodies that bind to CD47 and block out its protective signal. "If we can block this signal, we can get the immune system to eat [the cancer cells] up," said Stephen Willingham, a postdoctoral researcher in the … Continue reading →

Public release date: 26-Mar-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ] Contact: Angela Collom acollom@acponline.org 215-351-2653 American College of Physicians Philadelphia, March 27, 2012 AABB (formerly known as the American Association of Blood Banks) recommends a restrictive red blood cell transfusion strategy for stable adults and children, according to new guidelines being published in Annals of Internal Medicine. Physicians should consider transfusing at a hemoglobin threshold of 7 to 8 g/dL, as the evidence shows no difference in mortality, ability to walk independently, or length of hospital stay between patients on a liberal transfusion strategy or a restrictive strategy. Wide variability in the use of transfusions in the United States indicates that in many settings patients are receiving unnecessary transfusions. Our recommendation is based on the evidence that restrictive transfusion is safe and associated with less blood use, said Jeffrey L. Carson, MD, Chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick, NJ, and lead author of the guideline. Of course, clinical judgment is critical. Physicians may choose to transfuse above or below the specified hemoglobin threshold based on individual patient characteristics. A 20-member panel of experts based their assessment on a systematic review … Continue reading →

Nature | Health A Monsignor and Officer for Studies at the Pontifical Academy for Life called the cancellation a "sad event." Attendees are set to receive an official explanation March 26, 2012| By Ewen Callaway of Nature magazine The Vatican has abruptly cancelled a controversial stem-cell conference that was set to be attended by the Pope next month. The Third International Congress on Responsible Stem Cell Research, scheduled for 25-28 April, was to focus on clinical applications of adult and reprogrammed stem cells. But a number of the invited speakers, including Alan Trounson, president of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine in San Francisco, and keynote speaker George Daley, a stem-cell scientist at Children's Hospital Boston in Massachusetts, are involved in research using human embryonic stem cells, which the Catholic Church considers unethical. The previous two congresses had also included scientists who worked on such cells, without generating much controversy. Father Scott Borgman, secretary of the Church's Pontifical Academy for Life, one of the conference organizers, says that logistical, organizational and financial factors forced the cancellation, which was announced on 23 March. The academy weighs in on bioethical and theological issues that are relevant to Church teachings. The Catholic News … Continue reading →

SEATTLE, March 27, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Cell Therapeutics, Inc. (CTI) (NASDAQ and MTA: CTIC) announced that the University of Washington's ("UW") School of Medicine, Departments of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Division of Neuro-Oncology has begun enrolling patients in a randomized phase II clinical study comparing the combination of OPAXIO (paclitaxel poliglumex, PPX, CT-2103) and radiation therapy ("RT") to the combination of temozolomide ("TMZ") and RT for patients with newly-diagnosed glioblastoma multiforme ("GBM"), which is a poor-prognosis high-grade malignant brain tumor with an active gene called MGMT. MGMT is active in more than half of patients with glioblastoma and it substantially decreases the effectiveness of standard therapy with TMZ. This study is a multicenter trial initiated and led by the Neuro-Oncology department of the Brown University Oncology Research Group ("BrUOG") in Providence, Rhode Island. The first patient at UW recently has been enrolled. Dr. Maciej Mrugala, Associate Professor of Neurology, Neurological Surgery and Medicine at UW's School Of Medicine and Affiliate Investigator at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center is leading the study at the UW site. "Patients with glioblastomas are rarely cured, although current standard therapy with RT and TMZ has been shown to prolong survival. A Phase I/II study of paclitaxel … Continue reading →

SEATTLE, March 27, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Cell Therapeutics, Inc. (CTI) (NASDAQ and MTA: CTIC) announced that the University of Washington's ("UW") School of Medicine, Departments of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Division of Neuro-Oncology has begun enrolling patients in a randomized phase II clinical study comparing the combination of OPAXIO (paclitaxel poliglumex, PPX, CT-2103) and radiation therapy ("RT") to the combination of temozolomide ("TMZ") and RT for patients with newly-diagnosed glioblastoma multiforme ("GBM"), which is a poor-prognosis high-grade malignant brain tumor with an active gene called MGMT. MGMT is active in more than half of patients with glioblastoma and it substantially decreases the effectiveness of standard therapy with TMZ. This study is a multicenter trial initiated and led by the Neuro-Oncology department of the Brown University Oncology Research Group ("BrUOG") in Providence, Rhode Island. The first patient at UW recently has been enrolled. Dr. Maciej Mrugala, Associate Professor of Neurology, Neurological Surgery and Medicine at UW's School Of Medicine and Affiliate Investigator at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center is leading the study at the UW site. "Patients with glioblastomas are rarely cured, although current standard therapy with RT and TMZ has been shown to prolong survival. A Phase I/II study of paclitaxel … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (Mar. 25, 2012) UCLA researchers pinpointed a new mechanism that potently activates T-cells, the group of white blood cells that play a major role in fighting infections. Published March 25 online in Nature Medicine, the team specifically studied how dendritic cells, immune cells located at the site of infection, become more specialized to fight the leprosy pathogen known as Mycobacterium leprae. Dendritic cells, like scouts in the field of a military operation, deliver key information about an invading pathogen that helps activate the T-cells in launching a more effective attack. It was previously known that dendritic cells were important for a strong immune response and the number of such cells at an infection site positively correlated with a robust reaction. However, until now it was poorly understood how dendritic cells become more specialized to address specific types of infections. The researchers found that a protein called NOD2 triggers a cell-signaling molecule called interleukin-32 that induces general immune cells called monocytes to become specialized information-carrying dendritic cells. "This is the first time that this potent infection-fighting pathway with dendritic cells has been identified, and demonstrated to be important in fighting human disease," said the study's first author Mirjam Schenk, postdoctoral … Continue reading →

(RNN) - While no one can predict the future, history proves that people will virtually always choose a method that is more convenient, more efficient and more cost effective. Cell phones seem to win that battle on all fronts. But does that mean that the landline phone is on a virtual deathbed? This is the first of three stories in a series that explores the place of both cell phones and landline phones and how each will co-exist moving forward. -- As cell phones become sharper and more powerful, so do people's demand for their use. It is safe to say they have helped shape the world's culture. The technology that people can hold in the palm of their hand has made immediate impacts on the economy, media, entertainment and even the family structure. Asking people younger than 30 to imagine the world without cell phones would be akin to asking people older than 50 to imagine the world without the Vietnam War. Findings listed in the National Health Interview Survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show a gradual drift toward dropping home phones, or landlines. Between 2006 and 2009, the number of people who had … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (Mar. 22, 2012) In type 1 diabetes (T1D), pancreatic beta cells die from a misguided autoimmune attack, but how and why that happens is still unclear. Now, JDRF-funded scientists from the Indiana University School of Medicine have found that a specific type of cellular stress takes place in pancreatic beta cells before the onset of T1D, and that this stress response in the beta cell may in fact help ignite the autoimmune attack. These findings shed an entirely new light into the mystery behind how changes in the beta cell may play a role in the earliest stages of T1D, and adds a new perspective to our understanding how T1D progresses, and how to prevent and treat the disease. In the study, published in the March 22 issue of the journal Diabetes, the researchers, led by Sarah Tersey, Ph.D., assistant research professor of pediatrics, and Raghavendra Mirmira, M.D., Ph.D., professor of pediatrics and medicine at the Indiana University School of Medicine, show for the first time in a mouse model of T1D that beta cells become stressed early in the disease process, before the animal develops diabetes. In response to the stress, beta cells activate a cell death pathway … Continue reading →

PHILADELPHIA Nobel Laureate Peter Agre, MD, professor and director of the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute, Bloomberg School of Public Health, will deliver the address at the Perelman School of Medicine's commencement ceremony on Sunday, May 13, 2012 in Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts. Dr. Agre's research in red-blood-cell biochemistry led to the first known membrane defects in congenital hemolytic anemias (spherocytosis) and produced the first isolation of the Rh blood group antigens. In 1992, his laboratory became widely recognized for discovering the aquaporins, a family of water channel proteins found throughout nature and responsible for numerous physiological processes in humans including kidney concentration, as well as secretion of spinal fluid, aqueous humor, tears, sweat, and release of glycerol from fat. Aquaporins have been implicated in multiple clinical disordersincluding fluid retention, bedwetting, brain edema, cataracts, heat prostration, and obesity. Water transport in lower organisms, microbes, and plants also depend upon aquaporins. For this work, Dr. Agre shared the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Roderick MacKinnon of Rockefeller University. Dr. Agre received his medical degree from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 1974. In 1981, after post-graduate medical training and a fellowship at the … Continue reading →