[tabi] News Article of Interest
- From: <sgreenblatt76@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "TABI" <tabi@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 4 Aug 2009 13:22:26 -0400
I got this article from my Mom in a PDF image document. I converted it through
PDF 2 TXT and pasted the text below. I thought some on the list might be
interested in this future possibility.
Scott
"Effort is like rain drops, with enough your skill will become like a river."
- Satoshi Miki.
El Paso teen gets stem cell treatment in China in hopes of seeing Page 1 of 3
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statesman .cem
El Paso teen gets stem cell treatment in China in
hopes of S??lllg
He says treatments have improved lifelong vision disorder.
EL PASO TIMES
Monday, August 03, 2009
EL PASO - The quest for sight that took Lawrence E. Brown lll and his family to
China for an
unproven stem cell treatment will so on be at an end.
The El Paso High School senior received his last umbilical stem cell
transfusion and returned home a
few days ago, and so all he has left to do is wait.
He'll wait to see whether the nerves in his eyes strengthen and develop.
He'll wait to see whether he can better make out the colors and shapes that
have eluded him his entire
life.
He'll wait to see.
Brown, 16, was born with optic nerve hypoplasia, an underdevelopment of the
nerves in his eyes. He has
been able to perceive only light and shadows. He could see shapes and colors if
objects were held up at
just the right angle. »
That is, until last month, when the world began coming into focus.
After raising $60,000 for the procedure and travel expenses, Brown went to
Qingdao, China, on June 20
with his mother and sister.
He began acupuncture and electric wave therapy, which he described in his blog
as "like an intense
deep-tissue brain massage."
He received his first intravenous treatment of stem cells four days after his
arrival. On June 29, he
received his Hrst treatment of stem cells via a needle inserted into his spine.
He and his family decided to try the treatment despite its lack of endorsement
from the medical
community in the United States. `
http://statesmanprintthis.cliekability.com/pt/cpt?action=cpt&title=El+Paso+teen+gets+stem...
8/3/2009
El Paso teen gets stem cell treatment in China in hopes of seeing Page 2 of 3
Patients with optic nerve hypoplasia have long been told t.here's no treatment
for the condition. But
Brown sought the possible stem cell cure alter reading about one of its most
successful patients, a
. Colorado teenager whose vision improved so much that she obtained a driver's
permit.
Despite a fear of needles, Brown went forward with the treatment 7,000 miles
from home.
By July l, his eyes began to itch. He became hopeful, because others with the
·same condition who have
had improvement through the therapy had the same response.
On July 9, doctors told Brown his vision had improved slightly. His nystagmus,
or rapid involuntary eye
movements, had lessened.
"Today, I was able to see a candy wrapper on the floor. This is really exciting
news and after this it will
only get better," Brown wrote in his blog.
His vision is far from developed, but he's excited by the improvements he's
experienced so far.
"Colors such as red and blue, which I have always seen right up against my
eyes, are becoming visible
from a iiirther distance and much more vivid," he said in an e-mail.
Another new experience is perceiving movement from the shadowy shapes he now
sees.
"Yesterday, when we got out of the elevator, he got a little dizzy because the
silhouettes were moving,"
his mom, Georgina Brown, said in a recent telephone interview. "He was kind of
disoriented there for a
minute because he's never been able to see movement like that."
"The world seems a shade brighter than before," Lawrence Brown wrote. I
By July l2, his excitement was evident as he wrote about visiting a Buddhist
temple with his mom and
sister, though an overcast day kept his new visual experience from being as
sharp as it could have been.
"The colors and light were much more vivid to me. I could tell my mom and
(sister) Emani every time I
saw red," Brown wrote. "It's all over the temples."
A trip to the grocery store filled him with optimism because he noticed the
white lines of crosswalks as
. his taxieab made its way down the street. `
He said he'd never been able to see those lines from a moving vehicle before
that.
"The red lettering on the hospital was also visible to me," he wrote. "I cannot
tell the shapes of the
letters, but I could point to the red."
. He noticed that a mass of red was actually smaller shapes when he stopped to
examine flowers.
"I stepped back two yards and was still able to see that they were red. The
closer I was, I could see that
the red was not all one mass," he wrote.
A rainstorm July 13 made him notice lightning brighter than he'd ever seen
before.
He went to bed that night with his eyes itching as they had before.
http1//statesmanprintthis.clickability.com/pt/cpt?aetion=ept&title=El+Paso+teen+gets+stem...
8/3/2009
El Paso teen gets stem cell treatment in China in hopes of seeing Page 3 of 3
The Brown family originally was approved to receive eight stem cell treatments
for Lawrence. A ninth
packet of cells was approved as his vision improved.
He returned to El Paso to wait, hoping to watch the world around him become
brighter and sharper.
"I am just thankful for the results I have already gotten," Brown said.
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