Driving to work, playing with grandchildren, even walking up a flight of stairs – all of these everyday activities might be a thing of the past for someone who has suffered a major heart attack. Most victims suffer massive and irreparable loss of tissue and permanent damage, leaving them with a severely reduced quality of life.
But researchers here at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and in a separate study at the University of Louisville in Kentucky have pioneered an innovative new treatment for reversing heart damage – one that actually allows the heart to regenerate itself. In the procedure, patients who have suffered severe heart failure received an infusion of purified cardiac stem cells, taken from their own hearts.
Among 16 patients in Kentucky and 17 patients here, the results were astounding. Following the operation, not only was there a significant reduction in scar tissue, but the patients actually grew new heart tissue. Patients in the Cedars-Sinai study regrew an average of 600 million new cells. Within a year, heart function, measured by the amount of blood the heart is able to pump with each contraction, was markedly improved.
Traditional therapies, such as widening the arteries with a stent, haven't produced such dramatic results. If the procedure can be replicated in larger groups of patients, lives could be changed forever.
WEIGH IN:
Is this the beginning of a new age of healing for heart patients?
Guest:
Dr. Eduardo Marban, M.D., Ph.D, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute