Brain stem cell therapy shows promise for preventing MS

Health

as if Adriana Diaz

Scientists have discovered a breakthrough treatment that could stop the progression of multiple sclerosis (MS) in its tracks.

International team of researchers They published their findings Monday in the peer-reviewed journal Cell Stem Cell Stem cell injections may protect the brain from serious disease.

In their first-in-human, early-phase clinical trial, researchers injected neural stem cells into the brains of 15 patients with secondary MS recruited from two hospitals in Italy.

All participants had significant disability (such as needing a wheelchair) at the start of the trial, but no severe disability after one year.

The patients did not experience any serious side effects during the 12 months of follow-up.

Some have noticed minor side effects, but all have been found to be temporary or reversible.

The research team also examined a subgroup of patients and found that higher doses of injected stem cells reduced brain volume over time—suggesting that stem cell transplants reduce inflammation.

MS is an unpredictable disease that affects the central nervous system and disrupts the flow of information between the brain and body, leading to many symptoms, including numbness, tingling, mood changes, memory problems, pain, fatigue, blindness, and paralysis. .

Within 25-30 years of diagnosis, the disease eventually becomes debilitating for two-thirds of patients.

Although there are several approved treatments to help patients manage the disease, there is no cure or cure for the disease, leading experts to be very optimistic about these findings.

“These results show that specialized stem cells injected into the brain are safe and well-tolerated in people with second-stage MS,” said Kathleen Astbury, Research Communications Manager at the MS Society. he said in a statement..

He added, “They also suggest that this treatment method may slow the progression of disability.”

More than 2.8 million people worldwide live with MS, including 1 million in the United States; National Multiple Sclerosis Society Report.

The cause of the disease is not yet known.

“We are very interested in developing new treatments for secondary progressive MS, and I am cautiously excited about our findings, which are a step towards developing cell therapy to treat MS,” said Stefano Pluchino, who led the study at the University of Cambridge. Research is in the description.

“We recognize that our study has limitations – it was only a small study and there may be confounding effects of immunosuppressants, for example – but our treatment was safe and the results lasted over the 12 months of the trial. It means we can move on to the next phase of clinical trials.