A
New Hope….The “Wow” Of Stem Cell Treatments
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| Stem Cells under High Magnification |
There I was sitting in the
audience of the darkened convention center staring at the slides running on the
screen feeling a slight tinge of envy and an odd sense of disappointment
thinking that it could have been me there presenting these results, if only.
Ah, that "if only" plays a major part of all our lives doesn’t it?
Anyway to start from the beginning
I had spent the last three days at a specialty national conference as part of
my commitment for annual medical education to learn what’s new in the field of
regeneration. Too many times we get caught up in the everyday worries of
clinical practice and forget that there is a whole lot of innovation taking
place out there in science some of which may be a game changer to how we
practice medicine in the near future.
Take for example stem cells. Those
who follow this blog regularly know that i have in the past been dismissive of
what I have thought was the highly inflated claims of the stem cell
propagandists in touting it as a cure for all diseases (read here and here). Well I am happy to
confess that i have now changed my mind. I too believe in stem cells now. I
believe that soon, very soon we might have actually workable stem cell
therapies at hand- something which i would have argued against a few months
ago.
There is a thin line separating
skepticism and cynicism- what with all the false stuff floating around in the
name of miracle cures - science needs us to be ever vigilant and skeptic and
believe any claim only if it is proved or disproved with reliable evidence. But
to reject the hypothesis without examining the evidence at all is a sign of a
closed mind and cynical in the extreme. Thankfully I am not a cynic and if you
show me the evidence and it stands rigorous examination then I am happy to
change my mind and jump onto the bandwagon too. That’s the advantage of having
an open mind.
As I said earlier, I sat there (for
three days) in the darkened auditorium staring rapt in attention watching slide
after slide of before and after treatment photographs and micro-photographs
(histological slides under high magnification) of various diseases where stem
cells had been used and I came away impressed. I could see jaws which had been
amputated halfway- hemi-mandibulectomy done- grow back into normal jaws with
stem cells. And i saw unhealed diabetic ulcers and amputation wounds close down
normally with no sweat at all and I couldn’t help thinking that this stem cell
therapy thing is definitely a breakthrough in medicine.
Best of all these were all
mesenchymal stem cells harvested from routine menstrual blood and not embryonic
stem cells with all its hassles (complicated procedures) of cord blood
collection and storing even as the child is being born. That old adage of women
being life givers is once again being reinforced with even their menstrual
blood which is usually discarded as unsanitary -being put to life giving use.
And it made me think of that quaint old Indian habit of women being considered
as untouchables during their three days of menses and often set apart from the
pooja rooms and other religious ceremonies. Science is now providing a fitting
reply to religious obscurantism isn’t it?
If you think I am painting too
rosy a picture i would be the first to agree that there are still a lot of
steps to go through- there are unresolved issues in collecting the stem cells,
culturing them (growing them) in the lab and making use of them in the proper
way for the proper disease to get the proper result - for the cure should not
be worse than the disease, right? There are also worries about stem cells helping
cancer cells to grow faster along with normal cells and their cessation of
growth by contact inhibition is yet to be elucidated- that is how does the stem
cell know that your kidney is only this big and it stops growing further once
your size is reached? What if it decides to keep on growing in size till you
have the mother of all kidneys? What stops it actually? Food for thought right?
But anyway all these are technical
issues and once the proof-of-concept is validated then these can be tackled by
multiple people working simultaneously everywhere. Its like somebody inventing
the first car and showing that it can indeed run on the road and then people
everywhere get in to solve the practical issues- like one person inventing the
accelerator, someone else somewhere inventing the brake and someone else
inventing the gear box- none of which was possible till people believed that a
car could actually run as said.
And as the researchers stressed
again and again they were still only dipping their toes in using stem
cells for treatment, exploring the
possibilities of its application in a blind "let’s try this and see what
does happen" way and it was still in the experimental stage with no long
term results available YET. But if the initial results are anything to go by
then we are just that nearer to growing back lost or damaged organs- like a
kidney, liver or even an amputated limb. We can hopefully cure diabetes,
restore lost memory in dementia cases and even make sure that those with spinal
cord injuries and paralyzed in bed can take up their beddings and walk again-
as the bible says
It might take us another ten years
or fifteen for the treatment to go through all the approved regulatory agencies
and for all the working mechanisms involved to be studied fully - for we still don’t
know much about how/why it works - just that it works but eventually we are
going to be able to get commercially mass produced stem cells which can be
injected in a wound site and the damaged part is going to heal over nicely
without any sign of the original injury or scar.
I even got offers from one or two
companies which are early pioneers in this business (start-ups) offering to
supply me with stem cells for competitive rates at RS------for a million cells-
the total dosage to be determined by the wound size and disease. Of course if I
did buy them and use them on my patients it would have to be an experimental
trial (clinical study) only and i would have to go through all the prescribed
procedures for conducting such a trial prior to doing the treatment. Or I could
wait till it becomes mainstream in a few more years and then start using it on
my patients along with every other doctor.
As I said right at the beginning
of this post, over the three days I was there at the conference I did feel
slightly (well, a lot) envious of all the cutting edge advances taking place,
more so from the fact that i too could have been one of those up on the podium
getting the applause from the audience if only i had not been chased away from
all research by the memory of my bitter experiences during college days.
For those readers who have been
with this blog for some time I have in some of my past posts mentioned how when
I was a promising young researcher working on my thesis some of my results were
stolen in the pre-publication stage by a trusted mentor and I had to practice a
scorched earth policy in making sure that no one, including me, could ever use
that research anywhere. Not the wisest of options I guess- wasting two years of
my hard work in the bargain but I simply wasn’t willing to sit back and allow
myself to be cheated without fighting it to the bitter end.
Come to think of it now when i
have a far more mature head on my shoulders I feel that I overreacted and let
the shock of betrayal lead me to burn down the entire house to deal with a
backstabbing rat but for good or bad I swore off research forever and decided
to stick to clinical practice (and making money) for the rest of my life. So
for years and years i have been happily practicing my cutting and sewing
working with real patients instead of petri dishes and microscopes and making
me a comfortable living in the bargain- but there is always a tiny bit of
regret buried somewhere in my heart that i did not follow through with my
research ambitions, especially when i attend conferences like these and see
such cutting edge scientific advances.
I know it’s just presumptuous to
assume that I might have been a success as a researcher but who knows? The
future is a closed book to us and if destiny guides me to a path of research
again I might even chuck my scalpel away and start ogling at microscopes. Even
if I have to sacrifice some/lot of my current income and get accustomed to a
lower standard of living just so future generations can benefit from my
research findings. Besides there is a hidden thrill in research - that moment
when you see the first evidence of your hunch being proven right- a sense of
winning against your own doubts which is almost an orgiastic experience and it
pays off for all the sacrifices you made till then.
So that’s all about the stem cell
therapies i learned about recently which might provide a far more brighter and
enriching life (disease-free) to future generations of humanity- so much so
that I am tempted to label it "A New Hope" - a phrase familiar to all
Star Wars fans. The future, ladies and gentlemen, looks far, far bright than
the present. God bless us all.
