Hope for the future

Recently, a friend posted this link on facebook:-

Stem cells reverse heart disease

Previously, it was believed that when heart muscle died it stayed dead, but it has been proven that heart muscle can be grown back using adult stem cells.  This is revolutionary and flies in the face of conventional thinking.

And it got me thinking.  Thinking about many things, but one in particular.  And that was if this could work no a heart, could it work on another organ?  Yes, selfishly I was thinking about the kidney, but in my defence, you do have to look after yourself.

So I started to do some research.  Again, the conventional wisdom states that you can't grow new nephrons (the tubules that filter the blood, producing urine.)  But that is what they thought of the heart, and now they are growing new heart muscle.

So I wanted to see if there was anywhere that they had managed to isolate kidney stem cell and use them to grow new nephrons.  And yes! They have!.....  But only in zebrafish.  Apparently, adult kidney stem cells disappear in mammals around birth.  So what are the options in generating a workable treatment for kidney disease patients?

Well the way I see it there are three options:

1. Find adult stem cells in the kidney.  Just because nobody has found them yet doesn't mean they are not there.  The whole body replaces itself every 60 days.  Something must be there to replace kidney cells.  Scientists believe in the possibility too, or they wouldn't still be looking.
2. Manipulate other adult stem cells to behave like adult kidney stem cells.  Researchers have tried using bone marrow stem cells to repair heart muscle with some success.  The potential is there for kidneys too.
3. Embryonic stem cells.  However, the research here has a long way to go and is fraught with ethical issues and opposition

There was one other thing I was quite encouraged about with the zebrafish study.  Stem cells were harvested from one fish and successfully donated to another.  This means that the stem cells from the donor, that carry the donors DNA would now be working in the host.

So hypothetically, if I got a donation of kidney stem cells from a donor that didn't have cystinuria, my kidney would cease to filter cysteine and my disease would subside (theoretically).  There would be potential complications though, as with any allergenic transplant.  Rejection for example.

However, fellow cystinurics and kidney disease sufferers.  Don't start celebrating just yet, a workable treatment is still years away before it will even make it to trial.  At least we know that the research is moving in the right direction and one day, there will be a workable treatment that will be effective and give us some normality to our lives, and even if it is not there for us, it could be there for our children.  Until next time, stay well:)

Ps. here is the article on the fish research study:-

Adult Kidney Stem Cells Found in Fish