Friday JohnKu- AKA – TGIF Fri-Yay/Good News

~ John W. Howell
University of Milano-Biocca – credit University press

Today’s Good News comes from the Good News Network. Here it is in its entirety.

Exciting Clinical Trials of New Stem Cell Injection Treatment Shows Promise for Halting Multiple Sclerosis

By

Andy Corbley

A collaborative study involving experts in Europe and the US found the treatment of stem cells appears to protect the brains of MS patients from further damage.

In the first-ever clinical trials in humans, the researchers found patients injected with the stem cells exhibited no increase in disability or worsening of symptoms.

The promising study, published in the journal Cell Stem Cell, is hoped to lead to further clinical trials that could provide treatment for progressive MS.

More than two million people live with MS across the globe, and while some treatments currently available can reduce the severity and frequency of relapses, two-thirds of patients still transition into a debilitating secondary progressive phase of the disease within 25 to 30 years of diagnosis.

An autoimmune disorder like Lupus, ALS, and Crohn’s, MS is characterized by the body’s immune system attacking and damaging myelin—the protective sheath of tissue around nerve fibers, disrupting messages sent around the brain and spinal cord.

An immune cell called a microglial can attack the central nervous system in progressive forms of MS, causing chronic inflammation and damage to nerve cells.

Recent scientific advances involving the transplantation of stem cells have raised expectations that therapies could be developed to help ameliorate this damage.

Previous experiments in mice from the Cambridge University unit of the new study team have shown that skin cells reprogrammed to be brain stem cells and transplanted into the nervous system can help to reduce inflammation and may even be able to help repair damage caused by MS.

The research team behind the latest study, incorporating experts from the UK, US, Switzerland, and Italy, completed a world-first early-stage clinical trial in which neural stem cells were injected into the brains of 15 patients with secondary MS recruited from two Italian hospitals.

Along with the Cambridge unit, teams performed the trials at the University of Milano-Bicocca, the Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza and Santa Maria Terni hospitals in Italy, the Ente Ospedaliero Cantonale hospital in Lugano, Switzerland, and the University of Colorado in the United States.

The transplant patients were followed for 12 months. No deaths or serious adverse events related to the treatment were observed throughout the year. Side effects were mild, transient, and reversible.

All patients had a high degree of disability at the start of the clinical trial—for example, they were wheelchair-bound—but during the 12-month observation period, they showed no increase in disability or worsening of symptoms. None of the patients showed symptoms that would indicate a relapse or signs of clinical progression, suggesting substantial stability of the pathology.

A subgroup of patients was also assessed for changes in the volume of brain tissue associated with disease progression, which found that the larger the dose of injected stem cells, the smaller the reduction in this brain volume over time.

The researchers speculate that this may be down to the stem cell transplant dampening inflammation.

Professor Stefano Pluchino, a co-leader of the study from the University of Cambridge, admitted that though the research had limitations, the findings were extremely promising.

“We desperately need to develop new treatments for secondary progressive MS, and I am cautiously very excited about our findings, which are a step towards developing a cell therapy for treating MS,” he said.

“We recognize that our study has limitations: it was only a small study, and there may have been confounding effects from the immunosuppressant drugs, for example, but the fact that our treatment was safe and that its effects lasted over the 12 months of the trial means that we can proceed to the next stage of clinical trials.”

Professor Angelo Vescovi, another co-leader of the study from the University of Milano-Bicocca, added that it has taken nearly three decades to translate the discovery of brain stem cells into this experiment, which he said will “pave the way” to broader studies “soon to come.”

The Good News is that the scientific community is still working on improving life. Today’s JohnKu talks about perspective in a bad news world. I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Good News by John W. Howell © 2023

The media thinks,

All we want is the horrific . . .

How wrong can they be?

 

87 thoughts on “Friday JohnKu- AKA – TGIF Fri-Yay/Good News”

  12. Wonderful. Cheers to the scientific community’s continual pursuit to make life better. This is the second story like this I’ve encountered this morning – the first was about the improvement of a kid’s sickle cell anemia through genetic engineering.

    Liked by 2 people

  17. Thank goodness you are providing good news on a weekly basis, John. I have a few friends who have MS so every time I hear of progress, I think of them. A few are in wheelchairs (and have been for a good 20+ years) and some are still able to walk with relative ease. I think of them often and hope they find a cure.

    Liked by 3 people

  29. Your John Ku says it all! Oh, how nice it would be to see more and more GOOD news items popping up. This article gives us some hope, and that’s always a good thing to have! Thanks for sharing it, John, and here’s to a very happy holiday season!
    ☺️🎄☺️

    Liked by 2 people

  33. Your Johnku is spot-on.

    A former boyfriend (RIP) had MS, and two of my cousins have MS. It’s a cruel disease and affects people so differently (my cousins’ symptoms are grossly different from each other). I hope the research will continue. One of my cousins did get stem-cell therapy but it was probably 20 years ago now, and he had to go to Costa Rica because the treatment was not available in the U.S. Overall, they (he and his wife) had a good experience. They were impressed with the doctors and the facility, and they were able to meet and socialize with other patients. But we don’t know if the treatment did anything for him. Maybe slowed it down a tad. Still. He’s my age and in a facility now because he needs 24/7 care. My other cousin is still at home, but who knows for how long. Thanks for sharing the news. It might be too late for my cousins, but maybe not for someone else’s.

    Liked by 2 people

  34. Your JohnKu says it all about the media!
    This is the most exciting news I hav e heard about. the use of stem cells.
    Today I say – Hooray – for science!
    🐂 🦠⧗ 😷 ⧗ 🐂

    Liked by 3 people

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