[Originally written 16 DEC 2009]
Four months ago yesterday, my wife ("C") was discharged from our local hospital after being newly diagnosed with Wegener’s Granulomatosis. C’s rheumatologist, Dr. Maria E. Darland, told her that she would be able to "re-enter the world" in approximately six to eight months after treating her condition over that period with prednisone and cyclophosphamide. Unfortunately, after about a month and a half, C’s liver panels showed the onset of liver damage and she was taken off of cyclophosphamide in order to try to prevent any major, permanent damage; this was bad news because up to this point, her condition was responding well to the combination of the two drugs.
What if researchers could reboot a misfiring immune system? That is the intriguing possibility raised by stem cell transplant specialist Richard Burt. He is pioneering a new treatment for autoimmune disorders, one in which patients’ immune systems are suppressed and then replaced with an infusion of their own immune stem cells, filtered out from their blood. These then grow into all types of blood cells, including the white blood cells of the immune system.
via Body Attacks Self; Body Protects Self | Stem Cell Research | DISCOVER Magazine.
This research is particularly interesting to me because of my wife’s recent diagnosis with Wegener’s Granulomatosis (WG), an autoimmune form of vasculitis. The current treatment for this debilitating disease involves some rather toxic medications, such as cyclophosphamide (a.k.a. Cytoxan) and prednisone.