Stem Cell Research in Sports Animals

Dateline April 26, 2008

Fredericton, Prince Edward Island – Canada –

The human body is fragile, often easily injured, and is painful and time consuming to rehabilitate once the damage to body parts has been achieved. Sports, daily life, even just moving around for about 300,000 patients in North America afflicted with tendon and ligament damage is a daily chore that would, with traditional techniques, often lead to surgery and all the possible implications cutting open the human body entails.

Human scientific progress in the use of stem cell research and technology to repair tendon and ligament damage in athletic animals used for human entertainment may in the future lead to the results and information obtained about injuries of this type in sports animals being implemented in the recovery process for humans afflicted with debilitating tendon and ligament problems due to an injury that is painful, uncomfortable and significantly decreases their range of movement and the variety in their lives.
Research in this area of science has come under attack in recent times, with people concerned about the moral, ethical and biological implications of manipulating natural processes, without really understanding the possible implications of research about such a highly emotional subject and this has encumbered stem cell research due to prohibitions governing the research and use of stem cells in humans.

Canadian veterinarians at the Atlantic Veterinary College at the University of Prince Edward Island are currently partnering with VetCell Bioscience Ltd of the British Isles to bring a new equine stem cell therapy to Canada that can often make lame horses as good as new.

The new technology involves a revolutionary new technique in which veterinarians use techniques to multiply stem cells taken from the bone marrow of an injured horse and then re-injecting them into damaged tendons or ligaments. Does this medical technique have possible applications in the repair of human tendon and ligament damage; researchers think that if the technique works on horses, that eventually the technique will be adapted for use in treating human patients.

European experts say the technique has been used successfully in Europe for the past few years and injured animals treated with the technique have shown amazing recovery of their athletic ability. The British racehorse called Knowhere is the newest success story for the technique, with this former racehorse returning to racing and winning after being successfully treated with the new stem cell technique.

Researchers point out that any possible applications towards implementing this research to help humans suffering from tendon and ligament damage, like the sports animals that this technique is currently helping to recover from life altering and often life ending injuries, is still far off in the future, years of research and study will have to be conducted before these techniques could be used to help humans suffering from tendon and ligament damage, but at least there is a little light in the tunnel ahead of suffers.

The use of human stem cells to help humans suffering from physical problems with their hardware will increase in the years to come, if the technique and research turn out to be useful, but care needs to be taken any time humans attempt to manipulate a natural process, with only a few of the clues as to how, why, when and where a medical technique will work, the possible problems and implications of misuse of a natural biological process such as stem cell research could, like many human manipulations of nature, have even more severe consequences then the physical ailments we are using the controversial techniques to attempt to alleviate.