Cord Blood Stem Cells Information

A question about stem-cells and cancer?

I recently read an article about stem-cells proliferating cancer. How much evidence is there to support this argument? Is there any evidence against it? And if its true, what can be done to solve the problem?

Public Comments

1. hmmmm ... i havent heard anything about that, but it seems that stem cells cannot proliferate cancer unless they were themselves cancer cells. because thats what stem cells do you know, proliferate themselves. maybe the cancerous cells can cause neighboring stem cells to mutate into more cancerous cells and then the cancer would be outta control. and as far as a solution, well thats our biggest problem with stem cells, we cant make them stop growing!
2. A cancer, by definition, is a cell who's machinery for reproduction has gone haywire. The cell grows and grows, disrupting the other normal cells around it, and if it is in an organ, compromising it's function. Blood cancers, like leukemia and lymphoma are stem cell cancers, of a sort. The bone marrow produces any number of cell types, lymphocytes, leukocyts, red cells, platelets, plasma cells, etc. In the article, they specifically mention that the oldest stem cells, those that had undergone over 120 replications, that's 120 generations in cellular time. These cells developed a defective telomerase gene, which could not shut off the cellular replication process. This article implies that there may be a risk in using older generations of stem cells in treatment, as they may become cancerous. It does not address the issue of the safety of earlier generations of stem cells, the methods of growth and replication used by the researchers, etc. The researchers themselves state that the cut off point for using stem cells should be about 60 generations to reduce the cancer risk. Stem cell research is still in very early days, and if I had a cancer or disease which would definitely kill me, versus the risk that I may possibly develope a stem-cell induced cancer, I would still take the treatment.
3. I thought the opposite was true, in fact I am pretty sure that stem cell research is being done to find ways to use stem cells to fight cancer.
4. Did you really read the article? It said that in mice, stem cells injected into the brain showed some, but not all characteristics of cancer, when viewed under the microscope. Nor did it behave like cancer in vivo. That is the headline that the media "interpretation" of the findings ran, thinking it would garner readership, therefore advertising dollars.
5. Proliferate: "To grow or multiply by rapidly producing new tissue, parts, cells, or offspring." Considering that blood stem cells are being used as a treatment for certain cancers, if you're refering to blood stem cells I'd say there's very little evidence to support what you've heard. The Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, for example, specializes in treating blood-borne cancers by way of stem cell transplants. It worked for me. I'm a Hodgkin's Disease survivor who had relapsed three times. It took a stem cell transplant (using my own mother as my donor) to provide me with a lasting remission. Fingers are still crossed, but so far so good! Now... if you're refering to embronic stem cells, I'd say what you read was sheer propoganda designed to justify a person's standpoint against it. The truth is that not enough is known about embronic stem cells (religion keeps holding research back) to make such a claim -- anymore so than it's possible to call them a treatment for anything, since little is really known about their potential. Quite the touchy issue these days!