stem cells injected into blind eyes

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netrox

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This is kinda scary... I'd NOT be willing to be an experiment for that.

First patients have stem cells injected into their eyes to test 'cure' for blindness | Mail Online

If it works, great! I hope it works for them and that there's no serious adverse reactions, short or long term.

Also, it said it'll treat AMD and AMD is believed to be preventable by consuming more greens or egg yolks in diet. So, better eat greens/yolks before AMD takes away your vision!
 
If I were already blind anyway, I'd probably figure "What could it hurt?" I'd do it, in that case. Might not work, but if it did, what a miracle that would be.
 
Yes, it'd be a miracle. I don't think anybody would disagree on that one.
 
Wirelessly posted

Hubby and I discussed this with a retinal specialist not long ago. I was a candidate for this however guarantees aren't made with stem cell implantation because this is a relatively new field. A lot of research has been done with very little actual physical evidence to show for which is why both hubby and I aren't jumping into this. Cost is another reason; private insurance will pay for this but public health will not.
 
Mrs Bucket said:
Wirelessly posted

Hubby and I discussed this with a retinal specialist not long ago. I was a candidate for this however guarantees aren't made with stem cell implantation because this is a relatively new field. A lot of research has been done with very little actual physical evidence to show for which is why both hubby and I aren't jumping into this. Cost is another reason; private insurance will pay for this but public health will not.
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Personally, if I were losing my sight and if I were a possible candidate, I'd have looked into it but I think I wouldn't jump into this for much the same reasons as you either.
 
Beach girl said:
If I were already blind anyway, I'd probably figure "What could it hurt?" I'd do it, in that case. Might not work, but if it did, what a miracle that would be.
Click to expand...

It'd be great if this works out and if this expands into other area of vision loss it'd be nice to see that kids get the treatment as well and have their vision restored.
 
Mrs Bucket said:
Wirelessly posted

Hubby and I discussed this with a retinal specialist not long ago. I was a candidate for this however guarantees aren't made with stem cell implantation because this is a relatively new field. A lot of research has been done with very little actual physical evidence to show for which is why both hubby and I aren't jumping into this. Cost is another reason; private insurance will pay for this but public health will not.
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deafskeptic said:
Personally, if I were losing my sight and if I were a possible candidate, I'd have looked into it but I think I wouldn't jump into this for much the same reasons as you either.
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Same here. I'd look into it, but not sure I'd actually go through the procedure.
 
Since they turn to cancer, I would be afraid that would happen and spread beyond the eye.
 
One of these days, stem cell treatment for certain types of blindness is going to work. Here's an article about it. It's two years old already; certainly the research has progressed since then.

A Stem-Cell Therapy for Blindness  - Technology Review

So, me personally, if I had that type of blindness (not just "losing vision," but actually blind), no other surgical or medical intervention being helpful, yes, I'd do it. Nothing to lose, possibly my sight to gain. Why not take that bet?

According to this article, stem cells in the eyes do not cause tumors. It is possible, apparently, for tumors to form when stem cells are injected into other places in the body.

Fascinating research.
 
Bottesini said:
Since they turn to cancer, I would be afraid that would happen and spread beyond the eye.
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Exactly. The whole reason this is still experimental is because they have no idea what the long term consequences or even the long term results might be.
 
From the article I cited:

A second experiment tested the long-term safety of the cells in mice--an important requirement for moving into human testing--and found no evidence that the cells cause tumors.
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Of course it's still experimental. Takes a particular mind-set and perhaps a certain set of life circumstances to be willing to be one of the early recipients of this treatment. Eventually, my guess is it will work. Certainly the early adopters have no guarantee it will work NOW, of course.
 
Beach girl said:
From the article I cited:



Of course it's still experimental. Takes a particular mind-set and perhaps a certain set of life circumstances to be willing to be one of the early recipients of this treatment. Eventually, my guess is it will work. Certainly the early adopters have no guarantee it will work NOW, of course.
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I have blindness originating in the retina. I am not going to get stem cell therapy. I imagine it may be possible in the future, but the long term effects are so unknown now, that I prefer even NLP to the gamble.

It's easy to pay lip service if you aren't faced with the possibility yourself.
 
Beach girl said:
From the article I cited:



Of course it's still experimental. Takes a particular mind-set and perhaps a certain set of life circumstances to be willing to be one of the early recipients of this treatment. Eventually, my guess is it will work. Certainly the early adopters have no guarantee it will work NOW, of course.
Click to expand...

And you are aware that the life span of a mouse and the life span of a human are considerably different, are you not?
 
Bottesini said:
I have blindness originating in the retina. I am not going to get stem cell therapy. I imagine it may be possible in the future, but the long term effects are so unknown now, that I prefer even NLP to the gamble.

It's easy to pay lip service if you aren't faced with the possibility yourself.
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Don't disagree with that.
 
Bottesini said:
I have blindness originating in the retina. I am not going to get stem cell therapy. I imagine it may be possible in the future, but the long term effects are so unknown now, that I prefer even NLP to the gamble.

It's easy to pay lip service if you aren't faced with the possibility yourself.
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Sure, true enough.

As an intellectual exercise, it's interesting to consider, though. I *think* I would do it. But of course I'm not faced with actually having to make the decision, so like you said, easy to say. Who knows if I'd really do it, if the moment actually arrived.

Some other medical interventions would scare the bejesus out of me, but for some reason, this one doesn't.
 
I googled this a little bit, and found this article from almost exactly a year ago:

Some blind patients regain sight via stem cells

"Dozens of people who were blinded or otherwise suffered severe eye damage when they were splashed with caustic chemicals have had their sight restored with transplants of their own stem cells, a stunning success for the burgeoning cell-therapy field, Italian researchers reported last week.
The treatment worked completely in 82 of 107 eyes and partially in 14 others, with benefits lasting up to a decade so far. One man whose eyes were severely damaged more than 60 years ago now has near-normal vision. "

For scientific types, here is the link to the study reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.

MMS: Error

____________________________

This is using one's own stem cells, so it neatly avoids the risk of rejection, plus avoids the moral issues of using embryonic stem cells.

I had no idea that the research was this far along, let alone the success these Italian doctors have had. It's quite amazing.

I can only imagine the advances that will be made in stem-cell treatment of various ills by the time our children and even more, our grandchildren are adults.

Edited: even though the link says "error," it does work. I don't know why it changed the url I linked to. We can transplant stem-cells, but we still can't get links to parse correctly!!
 
Beach girl said:
I googled this a little bit, and found this article from almost exactly a year ago:

Some blind patients regain sight via stem cells

"Dozens of people who were blinded or otherwise suffered severe eye damage when they were splashed with caustic chemicals have had their sight restored with transplants of their own stem cells, a stunning success for the burgeoning cell-therapy field, Italian researchers reported last week.
The treatment worked completely in 82 of 107 eyes and partially in 14 others, with benefits lasting up to a decade so far. One man whose eyes were severely damaged more than 60 years ago now has near-normal vision. "

For scientific types, here is the link to the study reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.

MMS: Error

____________________________

This is using one's own stem cells, so it neatly avoids the risk of rejection, plus avoids the moral issues of using embryonic stem cells.

I had no idea that the research was this far along, let alone the success these Italian doctors have had. It's quite amazing.

I can only imagine the advances that will be made in stem-cell treatment of various ills by the time our children and even more, our grandchildren are adults.

Edited: even though the link says "error," it does work. I don't know why it changed the url I linked to. We can transplant stem-cells, but we still can't get links to parse correctly!!
Click to expand...

That's cornea which is on the outside. They have been doing cornea transplants for many, many years. So it isn't that far to go with the method in this article. The cornea has a simple function.
 
OK, but using stem cells is far different from doing corneal transplants. Especially using stem cells from the person's own body - no risk of rejection.

I'm just in awe of the technology and the science behind it all.
 
Hmm interesting. I know they are already working on stem cell research for the deaf as well but for some reason it seems more complicated than sight.
 
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