Japan Approves Stem-Cell Treatments For Parkinson's, Heart Failure In World Firsts (france24.com) 21
Long-time Slashdot reader fjo3 shared this report from Agence France-Presse:
Japan has approved ground-breaking stem-cell treatments for Parkinson's and severe heart failure, one of the manufacturers and media reports said Friday, with the therapies expected to reach patients within months.
Pharmaceutical company Sumitomo Pharma said it received the green light for the manufacture and sale of Amchepry, its Parkinson's disease treatment that transplants stem cells into a patient's brain. Japan's health ministry also gave the go-ahead to ReHeart, heart muscle sheets developed by medical startup Cuorips that can help form new blood vessels and restore heart function, media reports said. The treatments could be on the market and rolled out to patients as early as this summer, reports said, citing the health ministry, becoming the world's first commercially available medical products using induced pluripotent stem cells...
In a statement, Sumitomo Pharma said it had obtained "conditional and time-limited approval" for the manufacture and marketing of Amchepry under a system which is reportedly designed to get these products to patients as quickly as possible. The approval is a kind of "provisional license", the Asahi newspaper said, after the safety and efficacy of the treatment was judged based on data from fewer patients than in ordinary clinical trials for drugs.
A trial led by Kyoto University researchers indicated that the company's treatment was safe and successful in improving symptoms. The study involved seven Parkinson's patients aged between 50 and 69, with each receiving a total of either five million or 10 million cells implanted on both sides of the brain... The patients were monitored for two years and no major adverse effects were found, the study said. Four patients showed improvements in symptoms.
The article notes that "Worldwide, about 10 million people have the illness, according to the Parkinson's Foundation," while also notes that today's current therapies "improve symptoms without slowing or halting the disease progression..."
Pharmaceutical company Sumitomo Pharma said it received the green light for the manufacture and sale of Amchepry, its Parkinson's disease treatment that transplants stem cells into a patient's brain. Japan's health ministry also gave the go-ahead to ReHeart, heart muscle sheets developed by medical startup Cuorips that can help form new blood vessels and restore heart function, media reports said. The treatments could be on the market and rolled out to patients as early as this summer, reports said, citing the health ministry, becoming the world's first commercially available medical products using induced pluripotent stem cells...
In a statement, Sumitomo Pharma said it had obtained "conditional and time-limited approval" for the manufacture and marketing of Amchepry under a system which is reportedly designed to get these products to patients as quickly as possible. The approval is a kind of "provisional license", the Asahi newspaper said, after the safety and efficacy of the treatment was judged based on data from fewer patients than in ordinary clinical trials for drugs.
A trial led by Kyoto University researchers indicated that the company's treatment was safe and successful in improving symptoms. The study involved seven Parkinson's patients aged between 50 and 69, with each receiving a total of either five million or 10 million cells implanted on both sides of the brain... The patients were monitored for two years and no major adverse effects were found, the study said. Four patients showed improvements in symptoms.
The article notes that "Worldwide, about 10 million people have the illness, according to the Parkinson's Foundation," while also notes that today's current therapies "improve symptoms without slowing or halting the disease progression..."
Re:RFK [versus science, Part XVII) (Score:2)
Would you have been able to craft your joke for more humor if the FP thing worked differently?
Anyway, based on the Japanese coverage I have seen, I actually do see some linkage between your angle and the American medical problems... These are risky and speculative treatments and there is not really enough evidence of their efficacy. To a degree this approval was based on political considerations because the Japanese feel "national pride" in this homegrown technology.
However it's important to note that the J
Re: (Score:2)
Did it really work? (Score:4, Informative)
Looking at https://www.nature.com/article... [nature.com] Only four of six patients showed "improvement", and that too on highly subjective measurements such as MDS-UPDRS. On the Unified Dyskinesia Rating Scale (UDysRS), total scores increased (which means they had worse dyskinesia) at 24 months in all patients, except for one. Parkinson's symptoms improve btw slightly just by having a brain operation of any kind. The inflammation or stress seems to trigger placebo effect and some workaround pathways (and no they aren't dramatic and no you can't keep doing it repeatedly). Oh yeah and they had no controls. Why bother?
Re:Did it really work? (Score:4, Interesting)
After two decades, it didn't come up with much, and research funding is drying up. This looks like an attempt to "save face" by at least getting one drug on the market, even if it doesn't end up with a Nobel as they had hoped, even if no one ever prescribes it.
Kyoto University is often called "the Harvard of Japan," and it matches since both of them are more interested in politics than in solving problems or knowledge.
Back to the future IV (Score:2)
Back to the Future IV and Family Ties reboot when?
Fantastic! (Score:2)
I look forward to all the "pro-life" idiots choosing to death over these treatments... but we both know they won't because they have ideological consistency of a crayon.
Re: (Score:2)
I'll give you a try-over on that post...
" choosing to death " (proof-reading is a thing) = choosing death over these treatments (I assume that's what you meant)
And, you jump immediately to ideological consistency of a crayon (which I assume means ideology is as malleable as soft wax)... you're saying (not sure how I'm gonna do this... let's use brackets)...
[pro-life idiots, indicating you say that "all life is sacred" means aborting a fetus (a baby... let's get that clear right now) that _will be_ born hand
Re:Fantastic! (Score:4, Insightful)
If... (Score:1)
it can be shown it actually works for any Joe Blow it's tried on... the pharmaceutical companies will strike it down.
Gotta keep the funds coming from all the GLP1 prescriptions (notice most scripts are non-prescription).
Even if it'll save lives... there's been dozens/hundreds of trials of drugs and everything else you can think of that fit in this category... how many options do you have at the doctors office?
In the end, anything medical, no matter how life-saving it is, is entirely dependent on how much mo
Re: (Score:3)
GLP-1 doesn't work on heart failure. Heart failure is, despite the name, not where the heart fails or dies, like a heart attack. It's basically a condition where the heart just isn't pumping as well as it's supposed to. A normal heart pumps around 50% of the blood it contains each beat. A heart failure patient it's down to around 35% or lower.
This can be due to many reasons - a big one is enlargement of the heart causing there to be less effectiveness in the beat. (The whole Grinch "heart grew two sizes" is