While naysayers are so busy warning patients about the risks of offshore clinics, unproven treatments, etc., they are often silent when it comes to fraud and misconduct in research. The paper mentioned here was published in 2012. Were there no questions raised in 2012 by researchers in the field? Not according to this article. Apparently, many were inspired just because a group published a paper in a scientific journal.
Do we experience the same support as patients? Absolutely not! Patients are repeatedly warned of the risks, treated as imbeciles or small children and dismissed as having experienced the placebo effect if improvements are gained. The doctors who treat patients are either quacks or in it for the money. Patients are told they should get into approved clinical trials and not seek treatment at "unapproved" clinics.
Apparently, though it is perfectly acceptable to have patients treated in clinical trials inspired by a published paper. A lot of money has also been spent and now researchers are quibbling about whether or not a major clinical trial underway should continue or be stopped. Where is the data from the other clinical trials? How different is this from the Stamina controversy? Seems to me that there isn't that much difference at all.
Make sure to read the next post below this one on how heart stem cells orchestrate regeneration. Talk about the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing...........
BioEdge
by Michael Cook | 10 May 2014
More controversy over the therapeutic potential of stem cells. This week Nature published a study which was highly sceptical of using cardiac stem cells to regenerate heart tissue. Only two years ago, this experimental treatment was heralded as a revolutionary breakthrough and as a “heart failure cure” in the media after a paper by a group led by Dr Piero Anvera was published to great fanfare in The Lancet.
However, the technique’s reputation has declined steeply. “There’s been a tidal wave in the last few weeks of rising skepticism,” says Eduardo Marban, director of Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and an author of the paper in Nature.
In April the journal Circulation retracted a 2012 paper by Dr Anvera because of compromised data. A couple of days later, The Lancet issued “an expression of concern” about its much-cited paper. Its lead author was also Dr Anversa.
“This notice of concern, coupled with the recent retraction, is extremely troubling because of the large number of clinical trials inspired by reports from this group, the many desperate patients potentially affected, and the large amount of federal and private money that has been diverted from other areas of promising research to pursue these ideas,” Professor Jonathan Epstein, of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, told the Boston Globe.
Because a clinical trial using cardiac stem cells is currently under way, some researchers want to stop the trial. Others insist that they should press ahead.
Do we experience the same support as patients? Absolutely not! Patients are repeatedly warned of the risks, treated as imbeciles or small children and dismissed as having experienced the placebo effect if improvements are gained. The doctors who treat patients are either quacks or in it for the money. Patients are told they should get into approved clinical trials and not seek treatment at "unapproved" clinics.
Apparently, though it is perfectly acceptable to have patients treated in clinical trials inspired by a published paper. A lot of money has also been spent and now researchers are quibbling about whether or not a major clinical trial underway should continue or be stopped. Where is the data from the other clinical trials? How different is this from the Stamina controversy? Seems to me that there isn't that much difference at all.
Make sure to read the next post below this one on how heart stem cells orchestrate regeneration. Talk about the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing...........
BioEdge
by Michael Cook | 10 May 2014
More controversy over the therapeutic potential of stem cells. This week Nature published a study which was highly sceptical of using cardiac stem cells to regenerate heart tissue. Only two years ago, this experimental treatment was heralded as a revolutionary breakthrough and as a “heart failure cure” in the media after a paper by a group led by Dr Piero Anvera was published to great fanfare in The Lancet.
However, the technique’s reputation has declined steeply. “There’s been a tidal wave in the last few weeks of rising skepticism,” says Eduardo Marban, director of Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and an author of the paper in Nature.
In April the journal Circulation retracted a 2012 paper by Dr Anvera because of compromised data. A couple of days later, The Lancet issued “an expression of concern” about its much-cited paper. Its lead author was also Dr Anversa.
“This notice of concern, coupled with the recent retraction, is extremely troubling because of the large number of clinical trials inspired by reports from this group, the many desperate patients potentially affected, and the large amount of federal and private money that has been diverted from other areas of promising research to pursue these ideas,” Professor Jonathan Epstein, of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, told the Boston Globe.
Because a clinical trial using cardiac stem cells is currently under way, some researchers want to stop the trial. Others insist that they should press ahead.