By Jenny Hope Last updated at 1:03 PM on 14th February 2012 Breakthrough: The heart's own stem cells can be used to heal it, according to a new study The heart’s own stem cells can be used to repair damage caused to it, scientists say. They help the organ re-grow healthy muscle after a heart attack, a clinical trial shows. The procedure was found to halve the size of scar left on a patient’s heart muscle and led to a ‘sizeable increase’ in healthy muscle. Scientists said this discovery challenges a belief that scarring is permanent and that, once lost, healthy heart muscle cannot be restored. One year after receiving the experimental treatment, scar size was reduced on average from 24 per cent to 12 per cent of the heart. Patients who did not receive the heart stem cells had no reduction. Results from the U.S. study, published online in The Lancet medical journal, offer hope for patients with heart failure, where the pumping action is diminished. Researcher Eduardo Marb?n, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, said: ‘While the primary goal of our study was to verify safety, we also looked for evidence that the treatment might dissolve scar and … Continue reading →

MONDAY, Feb. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Stem cell therapy's promise for healing damaged tissues may have gotten a bit closer to reality. In a small, early study, heart damage was reversed in heart-attack patients treated with their own cardiac stem cells, researchers report. The cells, called cardiosphere-derived stem cells, regrew damaged heart muscle and reversed scarring one year later, the authors say. Up until now, heart specialists' best tool to help minimize damage following a heart attack has been to surgically clear blocked arteries. "In our treatment, we dissolved scar and replaced it with living heart muscle. Such 'therapeutic regeneration' has long been the holy grail of cell therapy, but had never been accomplished before; we now seem to have done it," said study author Dr. Eduardo Marban, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles. However, outside experts cautioned that the findings are preliminary and the treatment is far from ready for widespread use among heart-attack survivors. The study, published online Feb. 14 in The Lancet, involved 25 middle-aged patients (average age 53) who had suffered a heart attack. Seventeen underwent stem cell infusions while eight received standard post-heart attack care, including medication and exercise therapy. The stem … Continue reading →

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Wally Aman drove from Wheeling to the state Capitol Monday to deliver a message to state lawmakers: Autistic children across West Virginia are missing out on important treatment services because of a last-minute change to the state's new autism insurance law last year. Aman's 5-year-old twins, Thomas and Joseph, aren't receiving speech and occupational therapy -- services that would help them, he said.  "The unanimous passage of the autism bill last year gave parents who have children with autism hope," Aman said. "But because of a last-minute change in the wording of the bill, we have insurance for autism therapy that won't pay for autism therapy. We just want what our children were promised." The new law allows health insurance companies to cap the amount they reimburse families for all autism services at $30,000 a year. A previous version of the legislation put a $30,000 cap on only on behavior services -- the treatment considered most effective for autism. Parents with autistic children typically spend more than $30,000 a year on "applied behavior analysis," or ABA, Aman said.  So the cap forces families to pay out of pocket heir children's speech, occupational and physical therapies, and prescription … Continue reading →

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Feb. 13, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Complete Genomics Inc. (Nasdaq:GNOM - News) announced today that it has been selected by Mayo Clinic's Center for Individualized Medicine to provide outsourced whole human genome sequencing. Mayo Clinic researchers will now be able to employ Complete Genomics' sequencing service for some of its large-scale whole genome sequencing projects. The Center for Individualized Medicine operates a comprehensive sequencing laboratory in its own Medical Genome Facility, but it determined that collaboration with Complete Genomics could supplement the services available to its community of medical researchers. Under the terms of the agreement, Mayo Clinic can send genetic material to Complete Genomics for sequencing and analysis. It will continue to operate and invest in its Medical Genome Facility. Financial details of the agreement were not disclosed. "Mayo Clinic, through the Center for Individualized Medicine, already has several high-impact genome- and epigenome-based studies underway in individualized care for our patients," said Gianrico Farrugia, M.D., director of Mayo Clinic's Center for Individualized Medicine. "Access to quality whole genome sequencing services can only expedite our efforts to improve care for all of our patients with new individualized medicine tools and techniques." "It is exciting to see a … Continue reading →

February 13, 2012, 9:47 PM EST By Ryan Flinn Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Stem cells grown from patients’ own cardiac tissue can heal damage once thought to be permanent after a heart attack, according to a study that suggests the experimental approach may one day help stave off heart failure. In a trial of 25 heart-attack patients, 17 who got the stem cell treatment showed a 50 percent reduction in cardiac scar tissue compared with no improvement for the eight who received standard care. The results, from the first of three sets of clinical trials generally needed for regulatory approval, were published today in the medical journal Lancet. “The findings in this paper are encouraging,” Deepak Srivastava, director of the San Francisco-based Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, said in an interview. “There’s a dire need for new therapies for people with heart failure, it’s still the No. 1 cause of death in men and women.” The study, by researchers from Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, tested the approach in patients who recently suffered a heart attack, with the goal that repairing the damage might help stave off failure. While patients getting the stem … Continue reading →