If drink or disease destroy your liver, just grow a new one

[T_i_B]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=4YHM03MDWTWZNQFIQMGCM5WAVCBQUJVC?xml=/news/2004/11/14/nliver14.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/11/14/ixportal.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=50908

Patients whose livers are destroyed by alcohol or infection could grow a new organ using their own stem cells after a breakthrough by British scientists.

At present the demand for new livers outweighs the number provided by donors by 10 to one, a figure that transplant specialists expect to increase. The former footballer and alcoholic George Best caused controversy in 2002 when he received a liver transplant and then continued drinking.

Now researchers at London's Hammersmith Hospital and Imperial College are about to begin trials that could enable patients to rebuild livers inside their own bodies within five years. The first human tests of the method, which involves injecting stem cells to regenerate diseased livers, will begin before Christmas.

Nagy Habib, a professor of heptobiliary surgery at Imperial College, who is leading the research, said: "This could be the big breakthrough we have been looking for. We desperately need something in addition to transplantation.

[Gore1FL]

1. McCoy did that with Kidneys in Star Trek 4

Well he used a pill too --- but still it is amazing what was considered distantly futuristic a decade ago is now on the verge of being a modern treatment.

[unblock]

4. star trek "predicted" a lot of things

including cell phones, talking computers, and gps locators.

[Occulus]

12. that's because lately science has tended to follow science fiction

Scientists see these shows and wonder "how might we do that?" and then go invent it. That's a good thing, IMO.

[Gore1FL]

13. Well except for ther Terminator!

n/t

[Massacure]

2. Will this also reduce the chance of needing to take anti-rejection drugs?

[trotsky]

5. Totally unneeded.

It's your own cells - nothing to reject.

This would be fantastic if it works!

[tblue37]

8. I know two young kids,

siblings, who had liver transplants because of a genetic disease. (The transplants were from their parents.)

I wonder if eventually they will be able to grow a new self-celled liver for someone who has already had a transplant and therefore has no more of their own liver cells in their body. That would need further advances, of course, because they would have to "teach" undifferentiated stem cells to become liver cells. But the kids each had a transplant at age 2. The boy is now 13, the girl about 5 or 6. It would be wonderful if they could go off the immunosuppressant drugs! They have spent so much time in hospitals because of infections as a result of those drugs.

Of course, the fundies think a few cells in a petri dish are far more important than these very real, precious children, so they resist all stem cell research.

Idiots.

[sadiesworld]

3. This might come in handy after another 4 years of Bushco.

[Jeanette in FL]

7. You took the words right out of my mouth

"This might come in handy after another 4 years of Bushco."
Posted by sadiesworld

[eleonora]

6. Great news!

This is amazing...

[Liberal Veteran]

9. But...but...but...stem cells are EVIL!!!!!!

Red America told me so.

[VegasWolf]

10. There go those pesky stem cells again. damn things just

keep on turning into body organs! Who would'a thunk it.

[Ernesto]

11. Aw yes another industry that chimp has sent abroad

Talk about "off-shoring"! I guess chimp knows what's best for 'merica: better he retains his political support from fundy nuts than let science save lives (& jobs) on our own soil.

[truthisfreedom]

15. exactly! and bushco and their weirdo ideas will continue to force the

export and development of CRITICAL technology and seriously hemorrhage our economy.

[truthisfreedom]

14. here's the proper link

http://tinyurl.com/4f2ls

[daleo]

16. According to an earlier thread today, there is a law being proposed

To put a stop to stem cell research in the U.S. One of its more bizarre proposals is that any American citizen that gets stem cell related treatment outside the U.S. wouldn't be allowed back in the country. So, you may have to emigrate to Britain, should this come to pass.

[LeftyMom]

17. I hope that works!

My mother has Hepatitis C and while her liver tests are good right now there's a good chance she may need a transplant someday. Unfortunately, a lot of other boomers have the same problem and there just aren't going to be enough spare parts to go around. :(