Category Archives: Cell Therapy

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — An 11-year-old yellow Labrador suffering from severe arthritis underwent stem cell therapy on Valentine’s Day. It’s the first time a dog has received in-clinic adult stem cell therapy in Kansas City. According to Stanley Veterinary Clinic where Jake the dog is being treated, adult animal stem cell technology uses the body`s own regenerative healing power to help cure dogs, cats and horses suffering from arthritis, hip dysplasia and tendon, ligament and cartilage injuries and other ailments. Fat tissue is removed from the animal, the stem cells are separated from the fat and activated, and then injected into the affected areas. Within two months of the procedure, Jake should be moving well, with little or no pain. Severe arthritis affects up to 40 percent of the 164 million dogs and cats in the United States. As for Jake, FOX 4’s Kim Byrnes will have an update on his condition tonight on FOX 4 News at 5 and 6. Continued here: Dog Receives First-Ever Stem Cell Therapy in Kansas City … Continue reading →

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Nasdaq: TEVA; TASE: TEVA) and Gamida Cell Ltd. have completed enrollment of 100 patients for their Phase III clinical trial of StemEx, a cell therapy for the treatment of blood cancers, such as leukemia and lymphoma. StemEx is intended for adolescents and adults who cannot find a family related, matched bone marrow donor. Teva and Gamida Cell are conducting the multi-center international clinical trial through their joint venture, which they own in equal shares. StemEx is a graft of an expanded population of stem/progenitor cells, derived from part of a single unit of umbilical cord blood and transplanted together with the remaining, non-manipulated cells from the same unit. Gamida Cell president and CEO Dr. Yael Margolin said, "The joint venture is planning to announce the safety and efficacy results of the Phase III StemEx trial in 2012 and to launch the product into the market in 2013. It is our hope that StemEx will provide the answer for the thousands of leukemia and lymphoma patients unable to find a matched, related bone marrow donor." Margolin added, ?StemEx may be the first allogeneic cell therapy to be brought to market. This is a source of pride for … Continue reading →

A promising stem cell therapy approach could soon provide a way to regenerate heart muscle damaged by heart attacks. Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and The Johns Hopkins University harvested stem cells from the hearts of 17 heart attack patients and after prepping the cells, infused them back into the patients' hearts. Their study is published in the current issue of The Lancet. The patients received the stem cell infusions about three months after their heart attacks. Researchers found that six months after treatment, patients had significantly less scarring of the heart muscle and also showed a considerable increase the amount of healthy heart muscle, compared to eight post-heart attack patients studied who did not receive the stem cell infusions. One year after, scar size was reduced by about 50 percent. "The damaged tissue of the heart was replaced by what looks like healthy myocardium," said Dr. Peter Johnston, a study co-author and an assistant professor of medicine at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "It's functioning better than the damaged myocardium in the control subjects, and there's evidence it's starting to contract and generate electrical signals the way healthy heart tissue does." While this research is an early … Continue reading →

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwire -02/14/12)- VistaGen Therapeutics, Inc. (OTC.BB: VSTA.OB - News) (OTCQB: VSTA.OB - News), a biotechnology company applying stem cell technology for drug rescue and cell therapy, has identified its initial Top 10 drug rescue candidates and plans to launch two formal drug rescue programs by the end of next quarter. VistaGen's goal for each of its stem cell technology-based drug rescue programs is to generate and license a new, safer variant of a once-promising large market drug candidate previously discontinued by a pharmaceutical company no earlier than late-preclinical development. "We are now at an advanced stage in our business model," said Shawn Singh, VistaGen's Chief Executive Officer. "After more than a decade of focused investment in pluripotent stem cell research and development, we are now at the threshold where game-changing science becomes therapeutically relevant to patients and commercially relevant to our shareholders. We have positioned our company and our stem cell technology platform to pursue multiple large market opportunities. We plan to launch two drug rescue programs by the end of the next quarter." Over the past year, VistaGen, working with its network of strategic partners, identified over 525 once-promising new drug candidates that meet the Company's … Continue reading →

February 13, 2012, 9:47 PM EST By Ryan Flinn Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Stem cells grown from patients’ own cardiac tissue can heal damage once thought to be permanent after a heart attack, according to a study that suggests the experimental approach may one day help stave off heart failure. In a trial of 25 heart-attack patients, 17 who got the stem cell treatment showed a 50 percent reduction in cardiac scar tissue compared with no improvement for the eight who received standard care. The results, from the first of three sets of clinical trials generally needed for regulatory approval, were published today in the medical journal Lancet. “The findings in this paper are encouraging,” Deepak Srivastava, director of the San Francisco-based Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, said in an interview. “There’s a dire need for new therapies for people with heart failure, it’s still the No. 1 cause of death in men and women.” The study, by researchers from Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, tested the approach in patients who recently suffered a heart attack, with the goal that repairing the damage might help stave off failure. While patients getting the stem … Continue reading →

Stem cells grown from patients’ own cardiac tissue can heal damage once thought to be permanent after a heart attack, according to a study that suggests the experimental approach may one day help stave off heart failure. In a trial of 25 heart-attack patients, 17 who got the stem cell treatment showed a 50 percent reduction in cardiac scar tissue compared with no improvement for the eight who received standard care. The results, from the first of three sets of clinical trials generally needed for regulatory approval, were published today in the medical journal Lancet. “The findings in this paper are encouraging,” Deepak Srivastava, director of the San Francisco-based Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, said in an interview. “There’s a dire need for new therapies for people with heart failure, it’s still the No. 1 cause of death in men and women.” The study, by researchers from Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins University (43935MF) in Baltimore, tested the approach in patients who recently suffered a heart attack, with the goal that repairing the damage might help stave off failure. While patients getting the stem cells showed no more improvement in heart function than those who didn’t … Continue reading →

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - Cutting-edge arthritis treatment for our four-legged family members is now available in Columbia. Banks Animal Hospital is the first in the area to offer in-house Stem Cell therapy. It uses your pets own body to heal itself. Take 13-year-old Maggie, for example. The energetic pup has a limp that usually keeps her from jumping or going up stairs. "Today when everybody's out there filming her little limp it's not as pronounced because she wants to please," said Maggie's owner, Beth Phibbs. "She's just a great dog." But a great attitude wasn't enough to repair a bad case of cervical spine arthritis. So Monday, Beth brought Maggie to Banks Animal Hospital for the Stem Cell therapy. Like many, Beth had never heard of Stem Cell work in animals. "Until Dr. Banks mentioned it to me I was like, beg your pardon?" "There's no down side, no side effects because you're using your own cells," said Dr Ken Banks. Banks and his staff first gather some of Maggie's blood and fat. Both are good places to find the repair cells they're after. Adult stem cells, not the controversial embryonic kind, are then separated and spun down. "The repair … Continue reading →

WALKER, Mich. (WOOD) - Dogs who received the first in-clinic stem cell therapy in West Michigan returned to the vets who treated them Monday morning. Boris and Natasha returned to Kelley's Animal Clinic for their 60-day checkup after receiving stem cell treatment in December 2011. Dr. James Kelley and his staff of vets removed fat tissue from the dogs and activated it with an enzyme before injecting it into their back legs. This adult animal stem cell technology is different from the controversial embryonic stem cell therapy. Kelley said both dogs are doing amazingly well and that the procedure has done more than just help their arthritis. "We're finding that not only the joints are affected, the rest of the animal is affected as well," said Kelley. "The skin is better. The attitude in these dogs is much improved." Kelley and his staff have done 16 stem cell treatments since the first on Boris and Natasha, and he said all the dogs are showing signs of improvement after a short period of time. Here is the original post: Dogs who got stem cell therapy are well … Continue reading →

MONDAY, Feb. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Stem cell therapy's promise for healing damaged tissues may have gotten a bit closer to reality. In a small, early study, heart damage was reversed in heart-attack patients treated with their own cardiac stem cells, researchers report. The cells, called cardiosphere-derived stem cells, regrew damaged heart muscle and reversed scarring one year later, the authors say. Up until now, heart specialists' best tool to help minimize damage following a heart attack has been to surgically clear blocked arteries. "In our treatment, we dissolved scar and replaced it with living heart muscle. Such 'therapeutic regeneration' has long been the holy grail of cell therapy, but had never been accomplished before; we now seem to have done it," said study author Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles. However, outside experts cautioned that the findings are preliminary and the treatment is far from ready for widespread use among heart-attack survivors. The study, published online Feb. 14 in The Lancet, involved 25 middle-aged patients (average age 53) who had suffered a heart attack. Seventeen underwent stem cell infusions while eight received standard post-heart attack care, including medication and exercise therapy. The stem … Continue reading →

JERUSALEM--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Gamida Cell announced today that the Gamida Cell-Teva Joint Venture (JV), equally held by Gamida Cell and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, has enrolled the last of 100 patients in the international, multi-center, pivotal registration, Phase III clinical trial of StemEx, a cell therapy product in development as an alternative therapeutic treatment for adolescents and adults, with blood cancers such as leukemia and lymphoma, who cannot find a family related, matched bone marrow donor. StemEx is a graft of an expanded population of stem/progenitor cells, derived from part of a single unit of umbilical cord blood and transplanted by IV administration along with the remaining, non-manipulated cells from the same unit. Dr. Yael Margolin, president and chief executive officer of Gamida Cell, said, "The JV is planning to announce the safety and efficacy results of the Phase III StemEx trial in 2012 and to launch the product into the market in 2013. It is our hope that StemEx will provide the answer for the thousands of leukemia and lymphoma patients unable to find a matched, related bone marrow donor.” Dr. Margolin continued, “StemEx may be the first allogeneic cell therapy to be brought to market. This is a source of … Continue reading →