Health: An Important Development For Heart Patients Who Need Pacemakers Stephanie Stahl has more on what scientists are calling a new era of gene therapy. Official Site: http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/ Subscribe on YouTube: htt... By: CBS Philly … Continue reading →

By Dennis Thompson HealthDay Reporter WEDNESDAY, July 16, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers say they've found a way to transform ordinary pig heart muscle cells into a "biological pacemaker," a feat that might one day lead to the replacement of electronic pacemakers in humans. "Rather than having to undergo implantation with a metallic device that needs to be replaced regularly and can fail or become infected, patients may someday be able to undergo a single gene injection and be cured of slow heart rhythm forever," said senior study author Dr. Eugenio Cingolani, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute's Cardiogenetics-Familial Arrhythmia Clinic, in Los Angeles. Using gene therapy, the researchers altered a peppercorn-sized area in the heart muscle of pigs to create a new "sino-atrial node" -- the bundle of neurons that normally serves as the heart's natural pacemaker. The technique kept alive a handful of pigs suffering from complete heart block, a condition in which the heart beats very slowly or not at all due to problems in the heart's electrical system. The biological pacemaker also appeared to function as well as an original sino-atrial node and better than typical electronic pacemakers, said study co-author Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of … Continue reading →

A pacemaker that may no longer be needed if the new gene therapy technique works. By Rachael Rettner, Senior Writer for LiveScience 2014-07-17 22:15:37 UTC Electronic pacemakers can be lifesaving for people with abnormal or slow heart rhythms, but not everyone who needs a pacemaker is able to have an electronic device implanted in their heart. Now, in experiments in pigs, researchers have come up with a new method for making a "biological pacemaker" that might one day serve as an alternative to electronic ones, the researchers said. Making this pacemaker involves injecting a gene into heart muscle cells, which transforms these normal heart cells into special cells that can initiate a heartbeat. This method could be useful for certain patients, such as those who develop infections from electronic pacemakers and need to have the devices temporarily removed, or fetuses with life-threatening heart disorders who cannot have an electronic pacemaker implanted, the researchers said. "Babies still in the womb cannot have a pacemaker," study researcher Dr. Eugenio Cingolani, director of the Cardiogenetics-Familial Arrhythmia Clinic at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles, said in a statement. "It is possible that one day, we might be able to save lives by replacing … Continue reading →

WASHINGTON -- The study, published Wednesday, is one step toward developing an alternative to electronic pacemakers that are implanted into 300,000 Americans a year. "There are people who desperately need a pacemaker but can't get one safely," said Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles, who led the work. "This development heralds a new era of gene therapy" that one day might offer them an option. Your heartbeat depends on a natural pacemaker, a small cluster of cells - it's about the size of a peppercorn, Marban says - that generates electrical activity. Called the sinoatrial node, it acts like a metronome to keep the heart pulsing at 60 to 100 beats a minute or so, more when you're active. If that node quits working correctly, hooking the heart to an electronic pacemaker works very well for most people. But about 2 percent of recipients develop an infection that requires the pacemaker to be removed for weeks until antibiotics wipe out the germs, Marban said. And some fetuses are at risk of stillbirth when their heartbeat falters, a condition called congenital heart block. For over a decade, teams of researchers have worked to create a … Continue reading →