what are the current risks for adult stem cell therapy?

Question

please list sources. Why do we have risks if they are our own cells. thankyou

sorry but info is good. i need sources,without them your information cannot be sited

Answer 1

There are many issues. Firstly adult stem cell therapy is not, by definition, from one's own body, and therefore runs the same risk of the rejection response that tissue transplants have.

If the stem cells are truly autologous (i.e. coming from oneself) the main issue of concern is cancer. The reason for this is that stem cells by definition divide to become other cells, and maintain replication potential that other cell types don't have. This is exactly the issue that occurs in cancer - cell types acquire (by mutation in this case) the ability to replicate when they otherwise should not. We do not have enough knowledge on this issue to know how much of a limitation to stem cell therapy this particular issue is.

Answer 2

During any transplantation procedure, there is the possibility of excessive surgical damage occurring to the eye.
As previously mentioned unspecialised stem cells, especially embryonic stem cells, have the potential to cause tumours when transplanted.
As with any transplant procedure, there is always the possibility of the cells acting as vectors for infectious diseases. However this should be a minimal risk in most cases, as long as donor cells are properly screened prior to use. One particular worry is that virtually all human embryonic stem cells have been grown in contact with a special type of mouse cell, which feeds the stem cells essential products. It is possible that such stem cells might carry animal viruses transferred from the mouse cells and these obviously must not be allowed to pass into humans. To avoid this, embryonic stem cells can be grown with special cells of human origin, which feed the stem cells with equivalent products to mouse cells. Another option is to grow embryonic stem cells with artificial alternatives to feeder cells.