The Charlotte Lozier Institute, a research and policy development organisation, has just released a video highlighting the importance of stem cells. The video highlights the story of 10-year-old Devon Weaver from Arizona, whose life was saved thanks to a stem cell transplant.
Devon’s survival story begins 6 years ago, when he was struggling with every day activities like feeding himself and sitting up. Doctors ran a battery tests and discovered that despite being 4-years-old, he had the bone density of a 2-year-old.
By the time Devon was eight, he was diagnosed with Juvenile Myelomonocytic Leukemia (JMML), a very deadly form of leukaemia with a very low survival rate of between 5 and 10%.
Dr. Emmanuel Katsanis explains why this form of leukaemia is so deadly, saying: “It was a leukemia that would have been very difficult to get into remission with (just) chemotherapy. If you don’t die from a bleed, you will die of an infection. If you don’t get any treatment and it continues to proliferate, it obviously infiltrates other organs.”
Devon’s only chance was a stem cell treatment, which would allow his body to regenerate bone marrow and produce healthy blood cells. Unfortunately, Devon’s family had a genetic anomaly which made them unsuitable as transplant donors.
Doctors performed a worldwide search of donors and managed to find a perfect donor match located in Germany. Devon received the hematopoietic stem cell transplant and is in full remission today.
Devon’s stem cell transplant story is just one of many thousands that are reported each year. Bone marrow and umbilical cord blood stem cells are non-controversial forms of stem cells that have been used to save the lives of thousands of patients around the world the past few decades.
Researchers are looking at using stem cells to treat many other forms of diseases including multiple sclerosis. There is already an FDA-approved, phase 3 trial underway to determine the efficacy of stem cell transplants for treating MS. The initial results have been very positive and indicates that the use of stem cells may even be more widespread in coming years.
Source: Child with High Risk Leukemia Recovers after Stem Cell Transplant
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