Dumaguing: How Do You Mend a Broken Heart?

DEAR readers and friends, the author is not waxing romantic. The annual meeting of the American Heart Association held at the Los Angeles Convention Center on November 3-7, 2013 has very good news, both interesting and reassuring to both physicians and patients alike. Yes sirree, stem cells taken from patients or donors can treat people with enlarged hearts safely and with similar effectiveness.

This breakthrough, like a ray of bright California sun, is shared by Dr. Joshua Hare, lead author of the study, "the Comparison of Allogeneic versus Autologous Bone Marrow derived Stem cell Delivered by Transendocardial Injection in Patients with Ischemic cardiomyopathy trial (Poseidon), which is also published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). This cell therapy clearly had some clinical benefits and the mesenchymal stem cells from donors were just as safe as those from the recipient," adds Dr. Hare. "Even in patients who had several attacks in the past decades before treatment, both donor and recipient stem cells reduced the amount of scarring substantially, by 34 percent." The mesenchymal stem cells(MSCs) are unique in the sense that the bodys protective antibodies do not attack them - are found abundantly in the bone marrow of bones of adults. Previous studies indicated that MSCs might improve heart muscle function in patients with heart scarring from a previous myocardial infarction (heart attack). Heart muscle weakening from such scars (ischemic cardiomyopathy) is the most common cause of debilitating and deadly congestive heart failure.

The 13-month long trial is the first to compare the safety and efficacy of MSCs taken from the patients themselves against MSCs provided by suitable donors. Thirty patients with chronic ischemic cardiomyopathy, half of them received their own cells, while the other half received donor cells. Heart failure signs and symptoms improved in 28 percent of those receiving donor cells and in 50 percent of those receiving their own cells.

Regenerating new heart muscle with MSCs requires growing large amounts of the stem cells, which takes usually six to eight weeks. Using already-prepared donor cells might avoid this delay to treatment. Dr Hare states that, "because antibodies do not attack MSCs, donor cells can be prepare in advanced and stored until needed." Thus using donor cells is probably the more feasible approach." The stem cells were delivered directly into the damaged part of the patient's heart using a catheter with a needle tip. Dr. Alan Heldman, cardiologist and co-author of the study clarified that" an additional important finding is the safety of this new cardiac catheterization technique, which is a minimally-invasive procedure, done at the University of Miami Health System.

So for those of you whose hearts were broken by a failed love affair, a new found love may be the solution. However, for those of you who have a literally-broken, damaged heart, a very real, effective remedy is in the horizon! Cheers!

Published in the Sun.Star Baguio newspaper on November 10, 2012.

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Dumaguing: How Do You Mend a Broken Heart?