Study: Stem cells may treat strokes

© St. Petersburg Times,
published November 6, 2001

Stem cells taken from human umbilical cord blood reversed the effects of stroke in rats, suggesting that similar treatments may one day be used to treat strokes in people, researchers in Tampa and Detroit reported today.

The study, published in today's issue of Stroke, a journal of the American Heart Association, found that stem cells injected into the rats found their way to the damaged area of the brain, then began functioning as neurons.

Treated rats showed significantly more improvement in cognitive function than untreated rats, especially those that were treated 24 hours after the stroke was induced. It's unclear how the stem cells knew to migrate to the damaged area of the brain.

Rats that were treated seven days after the stroke also got better, but less dramatically, suggesting there might be a 24-hour window, or longer, for treatment. In people, today's best clot-busting drug, called TPA, must be administered within three hours of a stroke to reverse or slow a stroke's devastating effect on the brain.

"The concept that we've really been dealing with is: Can we open the window up?" said Dr. Paul R. Sanberg, director of neurosurgical research at the University of South Florida in Tampa and one of the study's authors.

"Right now for stroke, TPA is the drug of choice if you get in within 3 hours. The problem with that is, how often do you get a patient in within 3 hours of a stroke? It's not that often."

Sanberg said he hopes to begin safety trials in humans within two years.

The report builds on groundbreaking research from USF and Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit that Sanberg presented at a national neuroscience conference in February, which showed umbilical cord blood stem cells could be coaxed into behaving like brain cells when they were injected into the rats.

That's exciting because cord blood stem cells are abundant, and they don't come with the ethical questions of stem cells harvested from human embryos. Their work is funded in part by affiliate of Clearwater-based Cryo-Cell Inc., which harvests and stores umbilical cord blood from newborn babies.

"This is an important and very promising first step, but it's a very long way between an experiment in rats and a therapy in humans," said Dr. Larry Goldstein, director of the Center for Cerebral Vascular Disease at Duke University in Durham, N.C.

"We've been down that route with other stroke therapies."

© 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111

Contact the Times | Privacy Policy
Standard of Accuracy | Terms, Conditions & Copyright