Clinical treatment of heart fallure by adult stem cells: existing problems and prospects / 中国组织工程研究

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The prevalence of heart failure is increasing yearly. Although traditional treatment methods have made great progress in alleviating the progression of heart failure, cardiac tissue injury cannot be thoroughly cured. Cell therapy, however, has the potential to completely cure it through myocardial regeneration. OBJECTIVE: To review the current progress in adult stem cells from different sources in the treatment of heart failure. METHODS: A computer-based retrieval of PubMed and CNKI databases was performed in order to search relevant articles published from 2001 till now, using the keywords of "heart failure, adult stem cells, skeletal myoblasts, cardiac stem cells, mesenchymal stem cells. After removal of repetitive or irrelevant articles, 61 articles were finally reviewed. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Currently used adult stem cells for treating heart failure mainly include skeletal myoblasts, bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells, adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells, human umbilical cord blood mesenchymal stem cells and cardiac stem cells. Most clinical results have shown that adult stem cells have a good effect in the treatment of heart failure, and cause few adverse reactions. The mechanism of adult stem cells in the treatment of heart failure may be related to post-transplantation angiogenesis, paracrine mechanisms, and cell fusion, but the choices of specific cell lines, dose, route of administration and treatment frequency as well as the precise mechanism of action still need further studies.