All medical treatments have benefits and risks. However, unproven stem cell therapies can be particularly unsafe. Yes, stem cell therapy is a safe procedure. Physician should follow proper cell delivery techniques.
Patients should also be screened for treatment candidacy, as not everyone may be a candidate for stem cells. Stem cell transplantation is very complex. It may take 6 to 12 months or longer for blood counts to return to normal and for the immune system to work well. The side effects of a stem cell transplant can be very serious and even life-threatening.
Your health care team will monitor you closely during this time. Take steps to prevent side effects and promptly treat any side effects that develop. Infection is one of the most common early side effects of a stem cell transplant. It happens because the white blood cell count is too low and the immune system is weak.
Viral or fungal infections may also occur. As with any treatment, stem cell therapy has certain risks, including immune rejection of cells used in treatment. Stem cells have the potential to divide many times and differentiate into many types of cells, which is their great promise. Paradoxically, because of these capabilities, stem cells also have the potential to form tumors.
These potential risks dictate that both physicians and patients proceed with caution, and therefore it is vitally important that more research be carried out. A stem cell line is a group of cells that are descended from a single original stem cell and are grown in a laboratory. Cells from a stem cell line continue to grow, but do not differentiate into specialized cells. Ideally, they should remain free of genetic defects and continue to create more stem cells.
Clusters of cells can be taken from a stem cell line and frozen for storage or sharing with other researchers. Patients considering unapproved stem cell therapy should be aware that these procedures carry serious risks and may not be monitored by a qualified care team. New areas of study include the effectiveness of using human stem cells that have been programmed into tissue-specific cells to test new drugs. These cells are first added to a cell media culture, allowing them to replicate and produce higher numbers for a few generations.
The best defined and most widely used stem cell treatment is hematopoietic (or blood) stem cell transplantation, for example bone marrow transplantation, to treat certain disorders of the blood and immune system or to rebuild the blood system after treatments for some types of cancer. Adult stem cells may not be manipulated to produce all types of cells, limiting how adult stem cells can be used to treat diseases. Some clinics may also falsely announce that FDA review and approval of stem cell therapy is not necessary. And the FDA is increasing its oversight and enforcement to protect people from dishonest and unscrupulous stem cell clinics, while continuing to foster innovation so that the medical industry can properly harness the potential of stem cell products.
Clinics selling unproven stem cell treatments frequently exaggerate the benefits of their offerings and use patient testimonials to back up their claims. If you have a certain type of blood cancer, for example, transplantation of blood-forming stem cells makes sense, since treatment requires those specific cells to do exactly what they are designed to do. The FDA will continue to assist with the development and licensing of new stem cell therapies in which scientific evidence supports the safety and effectiveness of the product. Respiratory virus infections of stem cell transplant recipients and patients with hematologic malignancies.
Stem cells can be guided into specific cells that can be used in people to regenerate and repair tissues that have been damaged or affected by disease. .
