Tragic results of stem cell ‘cures’
researchers compiled a list of 35 adverse incidents resulting from unproven stem cell treatments performed mostly in China, Thailand, Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, Egypt, Dominican Republic and Russia. Some were done in Germany, Australia and the U.S. as well. The negative outcomes included tumors, blindness, brain hemorrhages, strokes, pneumonia and death.
The researchers observed, however, that their list was almost certainly incomplete, in part because the true number of treatments is unknown. The evidence at hand, however, indicated “substantial patient exploitation using the ‘power of hope.’ ”
Credulous media reports add to the dangers. Consider the recently reported experience of Caroline Wyatt, a prominent BBC journalist who at the age of 49 underwent a stem cell treatment for multiple sclerosis in Mexico in 2017, lured there by reports (on the BBC) of “near miraculous results.” She raised $84,000 from friends and family, because Britain’s health system wouldn’t cover the procedure. A month after her treatment, she told a BBC news program that she was “feeling better than I have done in a long time.”
The improvement didn’t last. In a follow-up report in February, she acknowledged that “today, I often feel worse than I did before.” Of the patients she has kept in contact with, some reported improvements, but others little change. “A few have said that they now feel worse than they ever did before ... and wish they had never had the treatment.” As she acknowledges, the causes of MS — and therefore the proper treatments — are unknown.
Clinics offering stem cell-based nostrums in the U.S. typically use cells derived from fat, removed from patients by liposuction, purportedly treated to concentrate the stem cells, which are then injected into a customer’s body.
The use of olfactory cells appears to be a relatively novel application for spinal cord injuries. The process isn’t utterly devoid of scientific logic. Olfactory mucosal cells have neuronal features and are known to regenerate themselves, which suggests they could fulfill the function of spinal cells, which don’t regenerate, at least in theory.
“It’s not entirely ‘out there,’ ” Hache says. “Legitimate research is being done, but as for the next leg, transplanting them in patients — we’re not there yet.”
One problem made evident from the Newfoundland case and others is that the tumors caused by the transplants may not develop for years. The Portuguese clinic, which reported on the experiences of 20 patients in 2010, followed up on the patients only for an average of about two years and none for more than four.
The Newfoundland patient’s tumor, however, didn’t make its presence known for more than seven years after his transplant, and then only because his condition was worsening as the tumor grew.
The lesson, Turner says, is that “if you put the wrong kind of cells in the wrong place bad things can happen, even if symptoms don’t manifest right away.”