Ethical Debates Adult Stem Cell Research vs. Embryonic Stem Cells

What is Adult Stem Cell Research and What are the Issues Surrounding it?

Is it ethical to let our body heal itself? It's programmed to do no less! Why then an ethical debate of adult stems and their use? Indeed, ethical debates about all types of stem cells, including the confusion of embryonic stem cells with adult stem cells - continue to rage in many countries, but not in all countries. For example, a patient's own blood can be used to generate the process of stem cells healing the patient's body. Often misunderstood by politicians and legislators, the process of harvesting adult stem cells is well defined by one biotechnology company focused on helping patients heal their own hearts and peripheral vascular systems.

Adult stem cells are present in the patient's blood, organs and tissues. Properly understood - such as bone marrow donated to oneself under certain treatment - they are a stem cell free of ethical debate because they do no harm, yet make the patient well.

For example, today's congestive heart failure patient has a better than 75% chance that she can repair her own heart using stem cells from her own blood. Where is the harm? In fact, the ethical dilemma is the reverse: How can we not use this life saving treatment when 652,000 Americans die each year unnecessarily from heart disease - a man every 39 seconds, a woman every minute.

How do Embryonic and Adult Stem Cells Differ?

Is it ethical to create life to harvest it as an infinite source of life saving therapeutics for the sick? Interestingly, for the foreseeable future, the embryonic solution requires more than winning that ethical debate. Scientist will also have to understand how to control its in-human differentiation into heart-like cells, for example, and prove beyond a reasonable doubt that their transplant did not lead to adverse events such as cancer five, or 10 or more years post-treatment.

Whereas synergetic cells - the patient's own stem cells generated from their blood - utilize the body's own signaling mechanisms, migrate to the site of need, engraft and enlist other circulating repair stem cells to the repair at hand. For embryonic stem cells, other complications are evident, including the following:

• Harvesting embryonic stem cells from fetal tissue destroys the donor fetus.
• There are a small number of embryonic stem cells available.
• Their long-term storage requirements limit their accessibility to scientists.
• Study of their use is expensive, time consuming, and study outcomes are at a theoretical potential juncture

The use of stem cells taken from the patient's blood is also alleviating the damage wrought by peripheral artery disease. Dramatic improvements in health and quality of life have been garnered by hundreds of patients treated by VesCell for Heart Disease and VesCell for PAD, products of TheraVitae Co., Ltd.

In 2006, TheraVitae was recognized by the World Economic Forum as a biotechnology pioneer in the area of stem cell therapy. The company's clinical trial results and science are published in the Asian Cardiovascular & Thoracic Annals (PDF) (2008, Vol. 16, No. 2) and the British Journal of Haematology (PDF).

If you’d like to know more about VesCell to address your heart disease or late-stage peripheral arterial disease, please contact jitra@theravitae.com, or dial 1-866-690-2030. Alternatively, take a minute now to fill out our inquiry form and a TheraVitae patient care coordinator will contact you shortly.

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