Chicago Woman Cured of Sickle Cell Disease

ScienceDaily (June 18, 2012) — Chicagoan Ieshea Thomas is the first Midwest patient to receive a successful stem cell transplant to cure her sickle cell disease without chemotherapy in preparation for the transplant.

University of Illinois Hospital & Health Sciences System physicians performed the procedure using medication to suppress her immune system and one small dose of total body radiation right before the transplant.

The transplant technique is relatively uncommon and is a much more tolerable treatment for patients with aggressive sickle cell disease who often have underlying organ disease and other complications, says Dr. Damiano Rondelli, professor of medicine at UIC, who performed Thomas's transplant.

The procedure initially allows a patient's own bone marrow to coexist with that of the donor. Since the patient's bone marrow is not completely destroyed by chemotherapy or radiation prior to transplant, part of the immune defense survives, lessening the risk of infection. The goal is for the transplanted stem cells to gradually take over the bone marrow's role to produce red blood cells -- normal, healthy ones.

Thomas, 33, had her first sickle cell crisis when she was just 8 months old. Her disease became progressively worse as an adult, particularly after the birth of her daughter. She has spent most of her adult life in and out of hospitals with severe pain and has relied on repeated red blood cell transfusions. Her sickle cell disease also caused bone damage requiring two hip replacements.

"I just want to be at home with my daughter every day and every night," said Thomas, who depends on family to help care for her daughter during her frequent hospitalizations.

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New Discovery May Eliminate Potentially Lethal Side Effect of Stem Cell Therapy

ScienceDaily (Aug. 15, 2011) — Like fine chefs, scientists are seemingly approaching a day when they will be able to make nearly any type of tissue from human embryonic stem cells. You need nerves or pancreas, bone or skin? With the right combination of growth factors, skill and patience, a laboratory tissue culture dish promises to yield therapeutic wonders. But within these batches of newly generated cells lurks a big potential problem: Any remaining embryonic stem cells -- those that haven't differentiated into the desired tissue -- can go on to become dangerous tumors called teratomas when transplanted into patients.

Now researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have developed a way to remove these pluripotent human embryonic stem cells from their progeny before the differentiated cells are used in humans. ("Pluripotent" describes cells that are able to become all types of adult tissue.)

"The ability to do regenerative medicine requires the complete removal of tumor-forming cells from any culture that began with pluripotent cells," said Irving Weissman, MD, director of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. "We've used a combination of antibodies to weed out the few undifferentiated cells that could be left in the 10 or 100 million differentiated cells that make up a therapeutic dose."

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