Home Calcutta News.Net Sunday 25th March, 2012 (IANS) Epilepsy is much more disabling than acknowledged - it impacts a child's learning years, a person's professional and marital life and also gives the patient a sense of insecurity - with the doubt "what if I have a seizure" always persistent, says an expert on the disease. According to Mamta Bhushan Singh, associate professor, department of neurology at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, "Epilepsy impacts all relationships, especially the marital life of a patient." "There is a reluctance of parents to talk of the illness while fixing up the marriage of their child. If a husband comes to know his wife is a person with epilepsy, it is frequent for the woman to be thrown out, irrespective of whether she is mother to his child," Singh told IANS in an interview. "The sense of shame and insecurity among persons with epilepsy has to be addressed," she said. Singh, who attends to patients in various parts of India as part of the Lifeline Express, the world's first hospital on a train, said she has come across many cases of children in Delhi's schools being thrown after having a seizure. "The schools … Continue reading →

Stroke support groups play a crucial role in stroke rehabilitation and recovery. PEOPLE have traditionally provided support for one another, especially when there are challenges. The classic example is the extended family. Whenever there is an event, especially an adverse one, relatives come together to provide assistance and support for the affected person. The support can be material or non-material. It is often of a varied nature and can be emotional, financial, information, etc. However, modern day life has seen the dismantling of the extended family in many societies. This has contributed to the formation of support groups. A support group is one in which the members provide assistance to one another for a specific purpose, which is usually problem-based. The assistance may include the sharing of personal experiences, considerate support, provision of information and care, and establishing social interaction. A support group has to be distinguished from other groups. The former involves contact between peers, eg people with a health condition. The latter involves the support of causes, eg politics, environment, employment, etc. There are various types of support groups. In the case of health conditions, they provide for the sharing of experiences, information and services as well as … Continue reading →

Published on Mar 25, 2012 CHICAGO (AFP) - Patients with advanced heart disease who received an experimental stem cell therapy showed slight improvements in blood pumping but no change in most of their symptoms, United States researchers said on Saturday. Study authors described the trial as the largest to date to examine stem cell therapy as a route to repairing the heart in patients with chronic ischemic heart disease and left ventricular dysfunction. Previous studies have established that the approach is safe in human patients, but none had examined how well it worked on a variety of heart ailments. The clinical trial involved 92 patients, with an average age of 63, who were picked at random to get either a placebo or a series of injections of their own stem cells, taken from their bone marrow, into damaged areas of their hearts. The rest is here: Stem cell therapy could repair some heart damage: Study … Continue reading →

HOUSTON - Doctors from the Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital have found that patients with heart failure may be able to repair the damaged areas of the heart with stem cells from the patient's own bone marrow. Doctors presented the findings at the American College of Cardiologys 61st Annual Scientific Session Saturday. The results are from a multi-center clinical study that measured the possible benefits of using a patients own bone marrow cells to repair damaged areas of the heart suffering from severe heart failure, a condition that affects millions of Americans. The study, which was the largest such investigation to date, found that the hearts of the patients receiving bone marrow derived stem cells showed a small but significant increase in the ability to pump oxygenated blood from the left ventricle, the hearts main pumping chamber, to the body. The expectation is that the study will pave the way for potential new treatment options and will be important to designing and evaluating future clinical trials. This is exactly the kind of information we need to move forward with the clinical use of stem cell therapy, said Emerson Perin, MD, PhD, Director of Clinical Research for Cardiovascular … Continue reading →

Public release date: 24-Mar-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ] Contact: Kristin Wincek kwincek@mhif.org 612-863-0249 Minneapolis Heart Institute Foundation CHICAGO Cell therapy may present an option for patients with ischemic heart disease to use their own bone marrow cells to repair the damaged areas of their hearts, and may pave the way for future treatment options, according to the FOCUS trial, which will be presented as a late-breaking clinical trial March 24 at the 61st annual American College of Cardiology (ACC) scientific session. This is the largest study to date to look at stem cell therapy, using a patient's own stem cells, to repair damaged areas of the heart in patients with chronic ischemic heart disease and left ventricular dysfunction. Researchers found that left ventricular ejection fraction (the percentage of blood leaving the heart's main pumping chamber) increased by a small but significant amount (2.7 percent) in patients who received stem cell therapy. The study also revealed that the improvement in ejection fraction correlated with the number of progenitor cells (CD34+ and CD133+) in the bone marrow; and this information will help in evaluating and designing future therapies and trials. "FOCUS is an incredibly important trial, as it has informed … Continue reading →

CHICAGO - Patients with advanced heart disease who received an experimental stem cell therapy showed slightly improved heart function, researchers said at a major U.S. cardiology conference on Saturday. The clinical trial involved 92 patients, with an average age of 63, who were picked at random to get either a placebo or a series of injections of their own stem cells, taken from their bone marrow, into damaged areas of their hearts. The patients all had chronic heart disease, along with either heart failure or angina, and their left ventricles were pumping at less than 45 per cent of capacity. All the participants in the study were ineligible for revascularization surgery, such as coronary bypass to restore blood flow, because their heart disease was so advanced. Those who received the stem cell therapy saw a small but significant boost in the heart's ability to pump blood, measuring the increase from the heart's main pumping chamber at 2.7 per cent more than placebo patients. Study authors described the trial as the largest to date to examine stem cell therapy as a route to repairing the heart in patients with chronic ischemic heart disease and left ventricular dysfunction. "This is the kind … Continue reading →