Stem cells are used to provide some amazing treatments for a number of different diseases. Problems arise when what would be referred to as “quacks” claim amazing, unproven treatments using stem cells. According to an article in Medical News Today, two pediatric eye surgeons recently expressed alarm over parents taking their children to mainland China for umbilical cord stem cell (CSC) transfusions. These treatments can cost up to $50,000 or more and parents are led to believe that this is an effective treatment for optic nerve hypoplasia (ONH), a disease causing partial blindness at birth.
According to the article, “Lawrence Tychsen, M.D., and Gregg Lueder, M.D., professors of ophthalmology and visual sciences at Washington University School of Medicine and pediatric ophthalmologists at St Louis Children’s Hospital, diagnose and treat dozens of children each year with ONH. They are concerned that the CSC reports will mislead many parents of children with ONH, who may bankrupt savings, go deeply into debt or organize fundraisers to pay for sham treatment.”
While parents have claimed improvement, there has been no objective documentation of improvement as a result of CSC treatments. Without scientific research, it is impossible to tell how much improvement is from the treatment, how much is from natural development, and how much is placebo from wanting the treatment to work. Besides the lack of evidence of these treatments working, the physicians are also concerned about the possibility of contamination for the injections.
This is an interesting article that really lays out the argument against these treatments. You can click here to read the entire article.
