Currently, surgeons can perform open-heart surgery on many of these infants to temporarily correct the condition, but the new patch or valve material is not biological and cannot be developed. together with children. This means they can be rejected by the patient’s immune system, causing surgical materials to gradually degrade and fail over months or years.
As a result, a child may have to undergo the same cardiac procedure multiple times throughout childhood, which can result in weeks of hospitalization, negatively impacting their quality of life and cause a lot of stress for the family.
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New stem cell therapy to treat heart valve defects
BHF professor Massimo Caputo has developed the first stem cell patch to repair valve defects in the great blood channel that controls blood flow from the heart to the lungs, as well as to repair holes between two main pumping chambers of the heart.
During surgery, stem cell patches are sewn onto the part of the child’s heart that needs to be repaired. The stem cells can then help regenerate heart tissue without being rejected by the child’s body.
The BHF has funded Professor Caputo over £750,000 to get the patches ready to be tested in patients so that clinical trials can begin within the next two years, allowing more babies and babies to be born. Benefit from life-changing technology. The materials have been shown to be safe in animal tests.
The team is also in the early stages of creating other stem cell technologies that will one day be able to correct more serious congenital heart problems using 3D bioprinting and gene therapy. .
Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan, Associate Medical Director at the British Heart Foundation, said: “If successful, this new stem cell therapy acts as a healing plaster that could revolutionize surgical outcomes. heart surgery for children and adults with congenital heart disease It can offer a solution that means their hearts can be mended once and for all in a single operation, saving people from having to face the future of repetitive surgeries and give them the gift of a happier and healthier life.”
Source: Medindia
