Over the last few years, technology, research, and success rates involving cellular therapy have skyrocketed. This treatment type holds a great deal of promise to help patients who suffer from chronic pain conditions.
What is Cellular Therapy?
Cellular therapy uses a specific type of cell, which are the only type of cell in the body that has the natural ability to generate new cell types. These cells are referred to as undifferentiated cells because they can become any type of cell. Our bodies require a variety of cells in order to survive and function, but each type of cell is not naturally produced in its full, mature state.
These cells, called mesenchymal cells, are cells in your body from which all other cells are created. These cells specialize in dividing to form more cells called “daughter cells.” Daughter cells then become new stem cells or highly specialized cells with specific functions such as blood cells, bone cells, brain cells, or muscle cells.
How Can It Be Used?
In theory, there is no limit on how stem cells can be used in medicine, since they have self-renewing qualities. Scientists and researchers have found that stem cells are useful in many ways, and the areas of utilization continue to progress.
- Understand how diseases occur. Watching and studying stem cells as they mature into their differentiated state helps doctors understand certain diseases and how conditions develop.
- Drug Development. Stem cells are used to test drugs for safety and quality. Studying the effectiveness of medications on human stem cells determines their accuracy and toxicity. Stem cells can be “turned into” specific types of cells under the supervision of a medical profession in labs, which allows Pharma companies to test how drugs work on targeted types of cells and conditions.
- Cell-Based Therapy. Stem cells play an important role in cell-based therapy. This type of treatment utilizes the understanding of cell development, how cells morph into different types of cells, and how those new cells are maintained.
- Regenerative Medicine. The body’s natural ability to heal itself is harnessed by stimulating the regrowth of damaged tissue or cells. Stem cells can be used because they can be grown externally and implanted into a patient’s body when natural regrowth is incapable of occurring.
Cell-Based Therapy
Cells play a vital role in many treatments for conditions like cancer and heart disease. Cellular therapy promotes the repair and regrowth of damaged, diseased, or injured tissue using the power of stem cells.
Mesenchymal cells can be grown in a laboratory setting where they are manipulated to grow into specific cell types – heart muscle cells, nerve cells, or blood cells. These cells are implanted into a patient. The healthy cells work to repair muscles and tissues that are injured or dysfunctional.
What Conditions Can Cellular Therapy Treat?
Stem cells have the ability to create new tissue for the use of transplants and regenerative medicine. Regenerative medicine harnesses the body’s ability to heal itself and regrow tissue and cells, creating a direct correlation to how stem cells are used in certain therapies.
Stem cell therapy is proven to be beneficial to patients with the following injuries or diseases:
- Spinal cord injuries
- Type 1 diabetes
- Parkinson’s disease
- Alzheimer’s disease
- Heart disease
- Cancer
- Osteoarthritis
- Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
To learn more about this type of treatment and what we offer, fill out the form below to get in touch with our team.