Experimental Stem Cell Therapy Raises Hope for Pulmonary Fibrosis Patients
A bold new approach using adult stem cell therapy has created an international medical first and raised the hope of patients with pulmonary fibrosis, a life threatening disease with as yet no known cure.
Hong Kong (PRWEB) November 3, 2009 -- A bold new approach using adult stem cell therapy has created an international medical first and raised the hope of patients with pulmonary fibrosis, a life threatening disease with as yet no known cure.
Adistem - adipose-derived stem cell therapy
Sixty-five year old Spyros Kanelos, a pulmonary fibrosis sufferer who also has emphysema, was given stem cell treatment on the 8th of October in a pioneering 'direct administration' method directed by Professor Demosthenes Bouros at the University Hospital of Alexandoupolis in Greece.
Having tried all available therapies over the past two years and unable to find a suitable donor for a transplant, the patient read of reports of the success of stem cell therapy by Hong Kong based Adistem, a biotechnology company that develops proprietary stem cell technologies for administration that are shared with qualified medical practitioners. Mr Kanelos was especially interested to learn of clinical trials in Asia involving the use of stem cells extracted from the patient's own abdominal fat. Although lung disease was not the subject of the trials, he noted that improvement in the emphysema of seven of the trial patients was observed.
After he contacted Dr Bill Paspaliaris, director of Adistem, the patient was able to arrange for treatment by Professor Demosthenes Bouros, Director of Pulmonary Medicine at the University Hospital of Alexandoupolis and Professor George Koliakos, a stem cell expert from Aristotle University. Initially, the medical team in Greece gave Mr. Kanelos intravenous therapy of his own adipose-derived stem cells. When a slight improvement was seen in the patient's pulmonary function tests Professor Bouros suggested administering the stem cells directly into the lungs, a previously untried method, but one which might give even better results. After receiving institutional ethics approval, the ten minute direct administration procedure was later successfully carried out by bronchoscopy with the patient under local anesthesia.
Mr Kanelos is now back home with his family in Athens awaiting results of the stem cell therapy due in a few months. Upon interview, Mr. Kanelos said "I hope it works for me, as it will give hope to the thousands of terminal sufferers around the world who cannot get a lung donor". There are five million people worldwide that are affected by idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. There are over 500,000 patients in the USA alone, where lung transplants are more easily available, and of these, more than 40,000 die from the disease annually.
Said Brian Dardzinski, Adistem Business Manager, "This imaginative approach by Professor Bouros and his team represents another important step forward in adipose-derived stem cell therapy. For pulmonary fibrosis patients around the world it offers the possibility of a life saving procedure. For medicine, it offers a new and possibly effective avenue of treatment for a host of life threatening conditions."
For further information and business queries, please visit "www.Adistem.com"
About Adistem
Adistem is a biotechnology company that discovers, develops and provides to licensed doctors autologous adult adipose-derived stem cell products that address serious medical conditions and assist, in particular, cosmetic and plastic surgery procedures. Adistem owns proprietary technologies that are licensed to major hospitals and world-class clinics.
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