[ SHOWGSD-L ] stem cell therapy for hip dysplasia
- From: "Peggy" <pmick12@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <showgsd-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 11 May 2008 14:22:30 -0400
http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080511/NEWS/805110332
Stem cells hold promise for ailing dogs
Local veterinarians try groundbreaking therapy
By Ken Bizzigotti
May 11, 2008
Anne Marie Ogle wants her Dasha back. She wants the long-haired German
shepherd her husband, Lee, gave her as a Christmas present nine years ago.
The dog who loved to chase squirrels all over the backyard of her Napanoch
home and go sledding in snowy mid-Hudson winters.
Not the dog whose hips are now so arthritic that she can't climb up a
flight of stairs or run in the backyard without dragging her hind legs along
the ground. Not the dog Anne Marie must feed a daily cocktail of
anti-inflammatories and pain pills that tax her liver.
Dasha is 9 years old. She was first diagnosed with severe hip dysplasia
four years ago. The condition is congenital, chronic and painful. "It's been
progressively worse," Anne Marie says.
The power of stem cells
With their treatment of Dasha, Drs. Bridget Bloom and Eric Hartelius are
now two of about 300 small animal veterinarians in North America using
Vet-Stem's stem-cell therapy, says Vet-Stem founder Dr. Robert Harman.
Vet-Stem started treating orthopedic injuries in horses with stem cells in
2004, but expanded to include dogs and cats a year later. "It's a big
problem, arthritis - 25 percent of all the dogs in the U.S. have arthritis,
that's 20 million dogs," Harman says.
Harman says more than 300 dogs have been treated since the therapy was
made available. Not only have 85 percent of the dogs treated shown at least
slight improvement, he says, but two-thirds have shown "substantial
improvement."
The results have been so encouraging that Vet-Stem is now studying ways
that stem cells can be used to repair liver and kidney tissue. Further uses
could include repairing cardiac tissue, even blood diseases and auto-immune
disorders.
"We're way, way ahead of them (human stem-cell researchers) in clinical
experience," Harman says.
Since the cells are taken from the animal itself, there's less chance
they'll be rejected. And there's no ethical controversy over their use:
These are adult, not embryonic, cells.
"It's not the fountain of youth," Harman says. "But they are pretty
amazing cells and they do a lot."
Bloom is certainly sold on stem cells. She says she's going to try the
therapy on her mother's dog, who suffers from arthritis.
It was February when Anne Marie read a story about a German shepherd in
Colorado with a similar condition to Dasha's, and a new treatment that led
to a remarkable recovery: stem cells, extracted from the dog's own fat, used
to regenerate tissue in its ailing joints.
Anne Marie studied the results - nearly 85 percent of the dogs treated
with stem cells showed at least mild improvement in joint movement or pain
level, according to Vet-Stem, the California company that offers the
treatment. Then she called Dasha's veterinarian in Kerhonkson.
I want to try this, she said.
The procedure costs $2,500, and it only treats the arthritic condition. It
doesn't cure it.
"People are going to think we're crazy," Anne Marie says.
Then she thinks of Thor. How she loved that big, beautiful German
shepherd. For 15 years, it was Anne Marie and Thor - he was even there
before she got married.
She'll never forget Dec. 22, 2001, when she had to put Thor down because
of a degenerative spine condition. "It was like I lost a part of myself,"
she says.
Dasha is a part of her, too.
"I might only have a couple of years left with her," Anne Marie says. "As
long as she's happy and not in pain."
A first for dog and doctor
It is a clear, sun-filled morning as Anne Marie drops Dasha off at Rondout
Valley Veterinary Associates in Kerhonkson for her operation. Then she
returns home. She can't handle being there when her dog is cut open.
Meanwhile, Dr. Eric Hartelius administers the final dose of anesthesia,
and after 30 minutes, Dasha is finally unconscious.
Two nurses carry the 40-pound dog to the basement operating room, where
Dr. Bridget Bloom slips a surgical mask over her face.
Bloom completed an online course offered by Vet-Stem to learn this
procedure just days earlier. She hadn't even heard of it until Anne Marie
called her.
But she's excited. She's tired of performing the alternatives: cutting out
the ball of the dog's femur, or a complete hip replacement.
And this: "We've put a lot of dogs to sleep because of arthritis," Bloom
says.
Machines tracking Dasha's vital signs beep and flash as Bloom carefully
slices an incision down her flank and pulls the skin apart. She tweezes out
layers of blood-stained fat just below the skin - two tablespoons worth -
and places them in test tubes. She quickly stitches the incision shut.
After the syringes containing Dasha's stem cells, above, arrive from the
California lab, Drs. Hartelius and Bloom, left, will inject them into the
dog's ailing hip joints. The cells will regenerate damaged tissue caused by
Dasha's hip dysplasia.
The tubes are loaded on to a FedEx truck, bound overnight for the Poway,
Calif., home of Vet-Stem. The company will extract the stem cells from the
fat and overnight them back east for injection into Dasha's hip joints.
"Compared to a hip replacement or bone removal, this is much less
invasive," Bloom says.
Two days later, Dasha is back on the operating table, unconscious again.
Hartelius feels around her hip for the arthritic joint, then jabs in the
hypodermic needle containing the stem cells and presses the plunger. Then,
the other hip. It's over in five minutes, and Dasha snores loudly in her
holding cage, waiting for Anne Marie to take her home.
"Now, it's the waiting game to see how she reacts," Hartelius says. "It's
up to her."
Six weeks have passed since Dasha's treatment. Her limp is just about
gone. She no longer takes pain medication.
She's still working on climbing the stairs.
Her doctors say it will be several more months until they can see the
treatment's full effect.
But when Anne Marie saw Dasha climb the fence one afternoon, she screamed
with joy.
A neighbor had just stopped by, and the dog greeted her by putting her
front legs on the backyard fence and standing on her hind legs - the same
legs she dragged around like anchors just weeks earlier.
"She's never done that before," Anne Marie says. "Every day, I see
something new."
Every time she sees her dog jump, every time she sees her bark at a deer
and chase squirrels in the backyard, legs churning and ears pointed straight
up, the joy consumes her.
She has her Dasha back.
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