The progress in the medical world is making indications that transplantation suitable cells are generatable from stem cells. When the brain is responding to injury, it produces new neurons from the brain stem cells. Studies with similar intentions give rise to the hope that neurodegenerative disorders suffered by humans could be cured by stem cell therapies. Stem cells have relatively special capabilities. These abilities give them the opportunity to self-renew. For some other stem cells, depending on where they originate from, they have the capability of differentiating into multiple cells and in some instances, they can differentiate to any of the cells within the body. Stem cell therapy a revolutionary and innovative approach to the treatment of a variety of patients such as stroke patients, but practitioners should exercise caution in its utilization due to its recent entry into the medical world.
There are well-established benefits in relation to the efficiency and safety of hematopoietic reconstruction utilizing stem cells derived from bone marrow or peripheral blood. Multiple neurologic and orthopedic diseases are being treated by the utilization of stem cells and hematopoietic cells that are retrieved from adipose tissue (Marks, Witten, & Califf, 2017) . The cells are often derived from either an allogeneic or autologous source. The possibility that this form of therapy is useful in treating numerous ailments and being revolutionary is sufficient enough to allow for the utilization of the therapy in clinical practice. Stem cells are uniquely capacitated to avail restoration of the damaged environment by taking note of their environment and making the necessary repairs through differentiation (Ding, Chang, Shyu, & Lin, 2015) .
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Some of the challenges of stem cell therapy are that they have been linked to adverse outcomes on the patients. Another challenge of stem cell therapy is that as much as the adverse effects exist, it has been difficult to keep up with them because of the complexity of the therapy. Furthermore, the fact that the administration of the therapy is outside clinical investigations there are no reporting channels (Ding, Chang, Shyu, & Lin, 2015) . There is, therefore, a need to conduct clinical trials in an attempt to determine the safety of allogeneic cellular therapies and stem cell therapies to the target end users. Given that such trials are absent it is not possible to make a clear judgment on whether the benefits of the therapies are more than the likely harms.
The working of cell therapy for stroke patients begins with brain surgery to transplant stem cells that are harvested from the bone marrow of the patient into tissues that are close to the areas of the brain that have succumbed to damage. Rather than integrating into the brain long term, the stem cells would enhance the native recovery function by pumping out significantly powerful proteins, molecules, and growth factors. Consequentially, the stem cell functioning would also result in the immune system modulation. Rather than planting new brain cells, stem cell therapy allows for the conversion of the brain into a young machine that easily regenerates cells. A clinical study of 18 patients gave rise to considerably successful results. A patient who had suffered a stroke a number of years ago reported having a considerable amount of motor movement after her limb was immobile since the stroke.
It is clear that stem cell therapy has the potential to impact greatly on the field of medicine. As some clinical trial indicate, patients are registering astonishing improvements such as the restoration of the locomotive functioning of stroke patients that were previously on wheelchairs. Practitioners must make a comparison of the benefits and the potential harmful outcomes of stem cell therapy. In an instance where clinical trial and extensive research would prove that the therapy is safe, then more stroke patients would benefit from the treatment approach.
References
Ding, D. C., Chang, Y. H., Shyu, W. C., & Lin, S. Z. (2015). Human umbilical cord mesenchymal stem cells: a new era for stem cell therapy. Cell transplantation, 24 (3), 339-347.
Marks, P. W., Witten, C. M., & Califf, R. M. (2017). Clarifying stem-cell therapy’s benefits and risks. N Engl J Med, 376 (11), 1007-1009.
