Your own kidney cells can cure kidney disease

[AguynamedKim]

Your own kidney cells can cure kidney disease
ANI Jul 28, 2011, 11.38am IST
Tags:Stem Cells

In breakthrough researches, scientists have found that patients' own kidney cells can be reprogrammed and used as a therapy against kidney disease.

Reprogramming patients' kidney cells could mean that in the future, fewer patients with kidney disease would require complicated, expensive procedures that affect their quality of life.

In the first study, Sharon Ricardo, PhD (Monash University, in Clayton, Australia) and her colleagues took cells from an individual's kidney and coaxed them to become progenitor cells, allowing the immature cells to form any type in the kidney.

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In the first study, Sharon Ricardo, PhD (Monash University, in Clayton, Australia) and her colleagues took cells from an individual's kidney and coaxed them to become progenitor cells, allowing the immature cells to form any type in the kidney.

Specifically, they inserted several key reprogramming genes into the renal cells that made them capable of forming other cells.

In the second study, Miguel Esteban, MD, PhD ( Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Guangzhou, China) and his colleagues found that kidney cells collected from a patient's urine could also be reprogrammed in this way.

If researchers can expand the reprogrammed cells called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and return them to the patient, these IPSCs may restore the health and vitality of the kidneys.

In addition to providing a potentially curative therapy for patients, the breakthroughs might also help investigators to study the causes of kidney disease and to screen new drugs that could be used to treat them.

The study was published in the Journal of the American Society Nephrology (JASN ).

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I would go so far as to say that I think that we will one day be able to grow our own kidneys for self-transplantation.  It won't be tomorrow, but hopefully in the next several years.  They've already been able to grow a kidney from stem cells saved from cord blood so I don't believe it's that far off.  I know it won't cure eveyone, but it could help a lot of us.

[RichardMEL]

I *love* Sharon Ricardo - mostly for her surname and that she's from Melbnourne (Monash is a local university here). WOO HOO.

Yes, I agree that at some point down the track stem cells are the obvious path to providing either replacement organs that will not reject and/or therapies to defeat diseseases like kidney disease, cancer etc. Exciting times, even if it isn't in my life time - these are the first steps into very promising medical technologies.

[Annig83]

On a side note:  my neighbor had a lung removed and he is using human growth hormones to aide in the regrowth... thought it was unusual, and didn't even know it was legal?  Any thoughts?

[AguynamedKim]

I bet there is going to be significant advancement in the treatment of kidney disease with stem cells and that it will be in your lifetime, Richard. I think perhaps one day Danny will have a playmate.

As for human growth hormone - there are numerous legitimate medical uses for it. What is illegal is for people to take it for performance enhancement, etc.  I hope your neighbor does well in his recovery.