SubooNews Your Trusted News Source
Worldwide, Parkinson’s disease is considered the second most common neurodegenerative pathology in people over 50 years of age. According to the data provided NotiPress for him Massachusetts General Hospitalbelonging World Health Organization (WHO).
In addition, WHO indicates that in Mexico, an estimated 50 new cases are registered annually for every 100,000 inhabitants. Similarly, current cases may increase in subsequent years due to population aging and increased life expectancy. life Global.
In this context, Massachusetts General Hospital indicates that it is essential to have new treatments to help patients with Parkinson’s disease improve their condition and quality of life. According to scientists at Massachusetts General Hospital and McLean Hospital, one of the most reliable alternatives is to reprogram the cells themselves.
That is, replace cells the patient’s skin with brain cells, a method that the experts themselves have described as infallible. “Using a patient’s own reprogrammed cells is a step forward in overcoming the barriers associated with using another person’s cells,” the statement said.
Kwang-Soo Kim, director Laboratory of Molecular Neurobiology at McLean Hospital assured that this clinical process is a milestone for personalized medicine. “Because these are cells from the same patient, they are easily accessible and can be reprogrammed so that they are not rejected after implantation,” said Kim.
To achieve this progress in the field of medicine, the scientific group reprogrammed the skin cells of a 69-year-old patient embryonic-like pluripotent stem cells. He later differentiated them so that they took on the characteristics of dopaminergic neurons that are often lost in Parkinson’s disease.
After running exhaustive tests on the cells, Kim’s group asked US Food and Drug Administration (FDA for its English abbreviation) application for an investigational new drug. After the application was approved, they also managed to get the agency’s ethics committee to allow hospitals to conduct implantation patient’s brain cells.
Medical professionals stress that at present, drugs and surgical treatments for Parkinson’s disease are only intended to treat symptoms. The solution that makes you lose dopaminergic neurons; however, the solution proposed by Massachusetts General Hospital and McLean Hospital is to go further by replacing those same neurons directly.
