Monday, March 21, 2011

Stem Cells May Show Promise for People with Rapidly Progressing MS

Source: American Academy of Neurology
Date: March 21, 2011

Summary:

ST. PAUL, Minn. – A long term study reports about the effectiveness of replacing bone marrow, purposely destroyed by chemotherapy, with autologous (self) stem cell rescue for people with aggressive forms of multiple sclerosis (MS). The study is published in the March 22, 2011, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. For the treatment, chemotherapy drugs are used to kill all of the patient's blood cells, including the immune cells that are believed to be attacking the body's own central nervous system. Bone marrow stem cells removed from the patient are purified and transplanted back into the body, which saves life by replacing the blood cells and also is proposed to 'reboot' the immune system.

HealthDay News and WebMD published news stories based on this news release today.