Impressive - lab grown organs put into patients

Post by **tnf** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 4:35 am

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12136506/

lab grown bladders - put into patients.

I could have used an extra one of those during my drinking days.

Post by **werldhed** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 4:59 am

Nice. Very nice.
I'm especially interested to hear how the transplant acceptance rates go, since preventing rejection is one of the main benefits from this technique. I guess we'll have to wait a little longer, but if they're functioning fine this far out, it's probably ok.

One other thing I'm curious about: Is it possible that seeding the organ with the patient's owns cells could result in the new organ eventually failing, too? Or maybe spina bifida still affects the new bladders eventually? Doctors? Any ideas?

btw... I thought this had already been done with bone and skin. Am I making that up?

Post by **Massive Quasars** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 5:09 am

Excellent news, first heard about it a few hours ago.

Post by **Canis** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 5:15 am

That's amazing! I think it's a great advancement in medicine, but am waiting for the skeptics and nay-sayers to put it down and try to link it to bad medicine.

Post by **Massive Quasars** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 5:17 am

If they can do this already, how far off are lab grown kidneys and livers? Huge market for those two, bladders, not so much in comparison.

Post by **tnf** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 5:23 am

werldhed wrote:Nice. Very nice.
I'm especially interested to hear how the transplant acceptance rates go, since preventing rejection is one of the main benefits from this technique. I guess we'll have to wait a little longer, but if they're functioning fine this far out, it's probably ok.

One other thing I'm curious about: Is it possible that seeding the organ with the patient's owns cells could result in the new organ eventually failing, too? Or maybe spina bifida still affects the new bladders eventually? Doctors? Any ideas?

btw... I thought this had already been done with bone and skin. Am I making that up?

Yea, I just showed a video in class about a skin graft using a piece of skin grown from the patients own cells.

I can't see acceptance being a big issue because the MHCs will be recognized as self...but I am sure there are complicating factors that are involved beyond that simple fact.

Post by **Canis** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 5:42 am

Massive Quasars wrote:If they can do this already, how far off are lab grown kidneys and livers? Huge market for those two, bladders, not so much in comparison.

The complexity increases massively for other organs in comparison. The bladder is essentially muscle and epithelial tissue, but the others have quite intricate mechanisms for filtering, pumping, and manufacturing essential chemicals for the body to function.