Tumor-Blocked Windpipe Replaced Using Synthetic Materials, Patient’s Own Cells

By GAUTAM NAIK

Doctors have replaced the cancer-stricken windpipe of a patient with an organ made in a lab, a landmark achievement for regenerative medicine. The patient no longer has cancer and is expected to have a normal life expectancy, doctors said.

A lab-made windpipe was implanted June 9 into a 36-year-old patient whose own windpipe was obstructed by a tumor.

“He was condemned to die,” said Paolo Macchiarini, a professor of regenerative surgery who carried out the procedure at Sweden’s Karolinska University Hospital. “We now plan to discharge him [Friday].”

The transplantation of an entirely synthetic and permanent windpipe had never been successfully done before the June 9 procedure. The researchers haven’t yet published the details in a scientific journal.

The patient’s speedy recovery marks another milestone in the quest to make fresh body parts for transplantation or to treat disease. More immediately, it offers a possible treatment option for thousands of patients who suffer from tracheal cancer or other dangerous conditions affecting the windpipe.

In 2006, researchers disclosed how they had implanted lab-grown bladders into children and teens with spina bifida, a birth defect. And in 2008, members of a team that included Dr. Macchiarini said they had given a patient a new windpipe made partly from her own cells, and partly from “scaffolding” material taken from a cadaver.

Read more of this amazing article and many other cures from Adult Stem Cells that proves that murdering babies isn’t necessary for Stem Cell Miracles — in fact, I have yet to see ONE miracle from the stem cells being used from a murdered unborn baby’s stem cells: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304793504576432093996469056.html