New opportunities for treatment of DMD?

PubMed, the Internet portal of biomedical and life sciences literature, indexed an interesting article, entitled ”Allogeneic umbilical cord blood stem cell transplantation in Duchenne muscular dystrophy” (Zhonghua Yi Xue Za Zhi 2005 Mar 2;85(8):522-5). Authors are Zhang C, Chen W, Xiao LL et al. from the Department of Neurology, First Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China. The article is about a study on the feasibility of treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) with umbilical cord stem cell transplantation. HLA matching was conducted for a 11-year-old DMD boy with family history was underwent umbilical cord blood stem cell transplantation. In the 42nd day, physical examination revealed obviously improvement in walking, turning the body over, and standing up. This is the first case of prospective clinical transplantation on DMD by allogeneic cord blood stem cell. The serum CK level decreases significantly after transplantation, which may slow down the necrosis of muscle cell. To access the full abstract of the article, click here.