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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-3622589/Major-breakthrough-doctors-REVERSE-symptoms-stroke-Patients-walk-talk-live-normal-life-stem-cell-treatment-3-YEARS-later.html
Doctors have reversed the
symptoms of stroke in a major medical breakthrough using stem cell
treatment, a Stanford University study has shown
Doctors have reversed the symptoms of stroke in a major medical breakthrough.
Patients
regained the ability to walk, speak and have a normal family life,
thanks to a procedure requiring only local anaesthetic and a single
night in hospital.
Remarkably,
the stem cell treatment was shown to work even three years after
someone had suffered a stroke - meaning that millions of people could
potentially benefit from the treatment.
Eighteen patients underwent the procedure in an initial trial - with stunning results.
Despite
the long gap between stroke and treatment, all 18 patients in the pilot
showed increasing improvement for the 12 months they were tracked after
the operation.
Nearly half showed ‘clinically meaningful’ results - which meant the procedure had a significant impact on their lifestyle.
One patient who relied on a wheelchair, unable to properly use her legs, has since taken up jogging.
Another
woman, who could barely get to her feet before the operation, has since
walked down the aisle and is now expecting a baby with her new husband.
And another, completely paralysed apart from the use of her left thumb, has regained the ability to walk.
The
treatment, carried out by scientists at Stanford University in
California, is thought to be so effective because it triggers the rapid
regeneration of brain circuits damaged during a stroke.
There are 1.2million stroke survivors in Britain - many who have never recovered their independence.
More
than 150,000 people have a stroke in England every year, with patients
suffering paralysis, speech problems and personality changes.
Experts
last night stressed that we are several years away from the treatment
being rolled out to all stroke patients - because far more testing is
needed before the procedure is proven to be completely effective.
The
experiment was only set up to establish that the treatment was safe -
which it did - but 18 patients are not enough to show that it will work
on all people.
But
the team has already started on work to replicate their results on a
larger scale, and if that is successful the technique has great
potential to revolutionise life for stroke patients.
The
researchers, whose work was published last night in the Stroke medical
journal, tested the treatment on 11 women and seven men, aged 33 to 75.
Each was given stem cells between six months and three years after they suffered a chronic stroke.
Although
stem cell treatments have been shown to work for stroke patients in
other small trials in the past, most have been given within days of
suffering a stroke.
But
the new study suggests that the treatment might work for a much longer
window - significantly expanding the number of people who might benefit.
Study
leader Professor Gary Steinberg said: ‘Patients improved by several
standard measures, and their improvement was not only statistically
significant, but clinically meaningful.
‘Their
ability to move around has recovered visibly. That’s unprecedented. At
six months out from a stroke, you don’t expect to see any further
recovery.’
The
participants remained conscious under local anaesthesia, while a small
hole was drilled through their skulls and stem cells injected into the
damaged area of their brain.
WOMAN CONFINED TO A WHEELCHAIR AFTER SUFFERING A STROKE AT 31, WALKS DOWN THE AISLE AND IS EXPECTING A BABY WITH HER HUSBAND
Twelve months ago Sonia Coontz proudly strode down the aisle to marry her fiancé Peter.
Just a few months earlier, such a feat would have been unthinkable.
Because Mrs Coontz had been consigned to a wheelchair, the victim of a vicious stroke that had struck when she was just 31.
She survived the stroke, but was left profoundly disabled.
Sonia Coontz suffered a stroke
when she was just 31 years old. It left her confined to a wheelchair,
unable to walk and profoundly disabled. Mrs Coontz pictured with her
husband Peter
‘It was very bad,’ Mrs Coontz, now aged 36, said last night, speaking from her home in California.
‘I
could not speak well, my left leg did not work very well so I had to
use a wheelchair. My right arm was almost dead and my shoulder hurt so
badly.’
Two years ago, Mrs Coontz was one of 18 patients to undergo a radical new procedure at Stanford Medical School.
Under
local anaesthetic, she received stem cell injections directly into her
brain, designed to regenerate the neural circuits left damaged by her
stroke.
‘After
the surgery instantly all that pain had gone from my shoulder,’ she
said. ‘I could move my arm all the way back for the first time.
‘And from that day on I never sat in a wheelchair again.’
Mrs
Coontz had been putting off her marriage, too embarrassed at her
inability to walk to put herself through the spectacle of a wedding.
‘Last June I was able to walk down the aisle,’ she said. ‘I would not have been able to do that before.
‘And now I’m pregnant - we are expecting a boy in September.
‘Every day I get better. I still have some recovering to do, but I feel terrific.’
Couldnt this have been caused by neuroplasticity instead of somehow dead neurons reviving? Especially since no trace of the stemcells was seen after?
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